"Well, I'll tell you. Though it is only a little domestic matter, one that perhaps you will hardly care to hear. You must know (to begin with) that Matilda has never made herself sociable with the other servants here; in return they have become somewhat prejudiced against her, and have been ready to play her tricks, tease her, and what not. But you must understand, Johnny, that I knew nothing of the state of affairs below; such matters rarely reach me. My cook, Hall, was especially at war with Matilda: in fact, I believe there was no love lost between the two. The girl's melancholy--for at times she does seem very melancholy--was openly put down by the rest to the assumption that she must have had some love affair in which the swain had played her false. They were continually worrying her on this score, and it no doubt irritated Matilda; but she rarely retorted, preferring rather to leave them and take refuge in her room." "Why could they not let her alone?" "People can't let one another alone, as I believe, Johnny. If they did, the world would be pleasanter to live in than it is." "And I suppose Matilda got tired at last, and gave warning?" "No. Some two or three weeks ago it appears that, by some means or other, Hall obtained access to a small trunk; one that Matilda keeps her treasures in, and has cautiously kept locked. If I thought Hall had opened this trunk with a key of her own, as Matilda accuses her of doing, I would not keep the woman in my house another day. But she declares to me most earnestly--for I had her before me here to question her--that Matilda, called suddenly out of her chamber, left the trunk open there, and the letter, of which I am about to tell you, lying, also open, by its side. Hall says that she went into the room--it adjoins her own--for something she wanted, and that all she did--and she admits this much--was to pick up the letter, carry it downstairs, read it to the other servants, and make fun over it." "What letter was it?" "Strictly speaking, it was only part of a letter: one begun but not concluded. It was in Matilda's own hand, apparently written a long time ago, for the ink was pale and faded, and it began 'Dearest Thomas Owen. The----'" "Thomas Owen!" I exclaimed, starting in my chair. "Why, that is the milkman at Saltwater." "I'm sure I don't know who he is, Johnny, and I don't suppose it matters. Only a few lines followed, three or four, speaking of some private conversation that she had held with him on coming out of church the day before, and of some reproach that she had then made to him respecting Jane Cross. The words broke suddenly off there, as if the writer had been interrupted. But why Matilda did not complete the letter and send it, and why she should have kept it by her all this time, must be best known to herself." "Jane Cross was her fellow-servant at Mr. Peahern's. She who was killed by falling down the staircase."