One day they came across a small Jewish maiden who was sitting by the road-side alone in a sorry plight. She was some distance from the factory, and had evidently been sent on an errand, for clutched in her grasp was a basket of provisions. A bottle of olive oil, too unwieldy for her to manage, had accidentally fallen out. She was surrounded by broken pieces of glass, and her thinly-clad feet had been painfully cut and scratched. Judging by her appearance, one might have credited her with having taken an oil bath, for, from her curly black ringlets down to her toes, she was literally covered with the greasy fluid. The girls’ kind hearts were touched by the sight. Celia, forgetting all strife in her compassion for the little one, bent down and inquired her name. After some amount of coaxing, she discovered that it was “Blume Horwitz;” that her feet hurt her so much that she could not walk; that her mother was waiting for the oil to fry the fish, and that she would be welcomed with a beating when she did arrive home. Her tale of woe ended in a fit of sobbing and gulping pitiful to behold. The girls consulted as to what they should do. They could not leave her there, on the chance of one of her people picking her up, nor could they carry her home, saturated with oil as she was. At length Celia decided to go home as quickly as she could for the pony-chaise, leaving her friend to stay with the child. This she accordingly did, and in less than twenty minutes was back again with the conveyance. The coachman gingerly covered the little girl with an overall belonging to the stable-boy, and lifted her into the chaise. Celia had brought some lint back with her, and between them the two girls skilfully bound up her wounds, which were not so severe as they had at first supposed. When they arrived at the Towers, a messenger was immediately despatched to inform Mrs. Horwitz of the accident, and to procure a change of clothing for Blume. Meanwhile the child’s wants were attended to in Celia’s pretty bedroom. An hour later, the coachman, Roberts, drove her home; clean, comfortable, and well-fed. He found the cottage shut up, for Mrs. Horwitz was always out at that time of the day; but a man was waiting at the wicket in anticipation of Blume’s arrival. Possessing small cunning eyes with an unpleasant leer in them, an aquiline nose, heavy jaw, and cruel mouth, his countenance was decidedly unattractive; and his burly form suggested an ample reserve of brute force. He was Anna’s husband, Jacob Strelitzki, who had recently returned after a year’s absence from the factory, spent no one knew where. Roberts pulled up at the wicket, and alighting from the chaise, eyed the man with disfavour. “Hello!” he said bluntly. “Strelitzki, is it? Thought I’d seen that ugly face before. So you’ve come back, have you? Been in quod, I suppose? Lost your curly wig, anyhow. Where is this kid’s mother?”