Mrs. Mapping's mild blue eyes, that seemed to the Squire to be of a lighter tinge than of yore, wore a passing sadness. Any one able to read it correctly might have seen she had her struggles. "Are you a widow?" "I--call myself one, sir," she replied, with hesitation. "_Call_ yourself one!" retorted the Squire, for he liked people to be straightforward in their speech. "My good woman, you are a widow, or you are not one." "I pass for one, sir." "Now, what on earth do you mean?" demanded he. "Is your husband--Mapping--not dead?" "He was not dead when I last heard of him, sir; that's a long while ago. But he is not my husband." "Not your husband!" echoed the Squire, pushing up his spectacles again. "Have you and he quarrelled and parted?" Any countenance more pitifully sad than Mrs. Mapping's was at that moment, I never wish to see. She stood smoothing down her black silk apron (which had a slit in it) with trembling fingers. "My history is a very painful one," she said at last in a low voice. "I will tell it if you wish; but not this morning. I should like to tell it you, sir. It is some time since I saw a home-face, and I have often pictured to myself some kind friendly face of those old happy days looking at me while I told it. Different days from these." "These cannot be much to boast of," repeated the Squire. "It must be a precarious sort of living." "Of course it fluctuates," she said. "Sometimes my rooms are full, at other times empty. One has to put the one against the other and strive to tide over the hard days. Mr. Pitt is very good to me in recommending the rooms to medical students; he is a good-natured man." "Oh, indeed! Listen to that, Johnny! Pitt good-natured! Rather a loose man, though, I fancy, ma'am." "What, Mr. Pitt? Sir, I don't think so. He has a surgery close by, and gets a good bit of practice----" The rest was interrupted by Mr. Pitt himself; he came to say we might go up to Mr. Brandon in the sick-room. We had reason to think ill enough of Pitt in regard to the Radcliffe business; but the Squire could not tackle him about the past offhand, this not being just the time or place for it. Later, when he did so, it was found that we had been misjudging the man. Pitt had not joined Stephen Radcliffe in any conspiracy; and the false letter, telling of Frank's death at Dr. Dale's, had not been written by him. So we saw that it must have been concocted by Stephen himself. "Any way, if I did write such a letter, I retained no consciousness of it afterwards," added Pitt, with candour. "I am sorry to say, Mr. Todhetley, that I gave way to drink at that time, and I know I was often not myself. But I do not think it likely that I wrote it; and as to joining Mr. Radcliffe in any conspiracy against his brother, why, I would not do such a thing, drunk or sober, and I never knew it had been done." "You have had the sense to pull up," cried the Squire, in reference to what Pitt had admitted.