bear to leave her; but I got mother out of the way,--for her ways are apt to be wearing to any one that’s in trouble,--and I stopped with Susan all the evening. But she never spoke once; she only lay quite quiet on the sofa, with her face turned to the wall; but I knew that she was crying all the time; and when I took her the baby, thinking the sight of him might comfort her, she only waved him away like with her hand. I didn’t leave her till twelve o’clock that night; but she was still lying on the sofa with her face turned to the wall. But just as I was going away she stretched out her hand and said, ‘God bless you, Jemima! it is very good of you to stop with me, but there is nothing upon this wide earth that can give me any comfort now.’ I didn’t see her the next morning, for she went out very early, and took the baby with her, and she didn’t come back till late at night, and then she came back without the baby. You might have knocked me down with a feather when I opened the door to her and saw her come in without the child. ‘Oh, Susan,’ I said, ‘what have you done with Robert?’--he’d been christened Robert after his ’pa, and I’d stood godmother for him. Susan was as pale as death, but she said very quietly, ‘I’ve put him out to nurse in the country, Jemima. I was obliged to part from him, for I’m going away.’ I thought all in a moment that she was going abroad to her husband, and that her grief had been about parting with her child; but then I remembered what she’d said the night before, about Mr. Lesley being dead to her, and do what I would I couldn’t make it out. I’m sure I was as much cut up at the thought of her going away as if she had been my own sister.” “I wish to Heaven she had stopped with you!” exclaimed Francis Tredethlyn. “She had few friends, poor girl, and had no need to leave any one who felt kindly towards her.” “But she did leave us,” replied Miss Banks; “she paid mother every farthing she owed her, and packed up her few little things. She would make me take some of her pretty ribands and collars that had been bought in Paris, and never worn out, for she didn’t care to dress herself smart when Mr. Lesley was not at home; and then she sent for a cab, and went away. I heard her tell the driver Shoreditch railway station, for I ran out to the cab and kissed her the last thing, and begged her to come and see us whenever she came back to London; and she promised that if she lived, and things went well with her, she would. But from that day to this we’ve never set eyes upon her.”