"To see to it, perhaps, sir, but not to relieve it; I should be surprised if they did that. One of them called here ever so many weeks ago and frightened Mrs. Mapping with his harsh questions; but he gave her nothing." "I don't understand all this," cried the Squire, rumpling his hair. "Was it a gentleman?"--turning to Mrs. Mapping. "He was dressed as one," she said, "but he was loud and dictatorial, almost as though he thought me a criminal instead of a poor sick woman. He asked me all kinds of questions about my past life, where I had lived and what I had done, and wrote down the answers." "Go on," said the Squire, as she paused for breath. "As they sent me no relief and did not come again, Miss Kester, after two or three weeks had gone by, was good enough to send a messenger to the place: her nephew. He saw the gentlemen there and told them I was getting weaker daily and was in dreadful need, if they would please to give me a trifle; he said he should never have thought of applying to them but for their having come to see after me. The gentlemen answered unfavourably; inquiries had been made, they sternly told him, and the case was found to be one not suitable for relief, that I did not deserve it. I--I--have never done anything wrong willingly," sobbed the poor woman, breaking down. "I don't think she has, sir; she don't seem like it; and I'm sure she struggled hard enough to get a living at No. 60," said Miss Kester. "Any way, they did nothing for her--they've just left her to starve and die." I had seen the Squire in many a temper, but never in a worse than now. He flung out of the room, calling upon me to follow him, and climbed into the hansom that waited for us outside. "To Benevolence Hall," roared he, "and drive like the deuce." "Yes, sir," said the man. "Where is Benevolence Hall?" I gave him the address, and the man whirled us to Benevolence Hall in a very short time. The Squire leaped out and indoors, primed. In the office stood a young man, going over some accounts by gaslight. His flaxen hair was parted down the middle, and he looked uncommonly simple. The rest of the benevolent gentlemen had left for the day. What the Squire said at first, I hardly know: I don't think he knew himself. His words came tumbling out in a way that astonished the clerk. "Mrs. Mapping," cried the young man, when he could understand a little what the anger was about. "Your ten pounds?--meant for her, you say----" "Yes, my ten pounds," wrathfully broke in the Squire; "my ten-pound cheque that I paid down here on this very table. What have you done with it?" "Oh, that ten pounds has been spent, partly so, at least, in making inquiries about the woman, looking-up her back history and all that. Looking-up the back lives of people takes a lot of money, you see." "But why did you not relieve her with it, or a portion of it? That is the question I've come to ask, young man, and I intend to have it answered."