“I agree with you entirely, Mrs. Sweeting, about the inferiority of Mrs. Swanley to this newcomer, but we must consider Miss Tarrant’s position in the parish and her responsibilities. She is no doubt right from her point of view.” So the conversation ended, but Mrs. Fairfax’s biography, which was to be published under authority in Langborough, was now rounded off and complete. She was a Parisian, father and mother unknown, was found in Paris in 1815 by Captain Fairfax, who, by her intrigues and threats of exposure, was forced into a marriage with her. A few years afterwards he had grounds for a divorce, but not wishing a scandal, consented to a compromise and voluntary separation. He left one child in her custody, as it showed signs of resemblance to its mother, to whom he gave a small monthly allowance. She had been apprenticed as a dressmaker in Paris, had returned thither in order to master her trade, and then came back to England. In a very little time, so clever was she that she learned to speak English fluently, although, as Mrs. Bingham at once noticed, the French accent was very perceptible. It was a good, intelligible, working theory, and that was all that was wanted. This was Mrs. Fairfax so far as her female neighbours were concerned. To the men in Langborough she was what she was to the women, but with a difference. When she went to Mr. Sweeting’s shop to order her groceries, Mr. Sweeting, notwithstanding the canonical legend of her life, served her himself, and was much entangled by her dark hair, and was drawn down by it into a most polite bow. Mr. Cobb, who had a little cabin of an office in his coal-yard, hastened back to it from superintending the discharge of a lighter, when Mrs. Fairfax called to pay her little bill, actually took off his hat, begged her to be seated, and hoped she did not find the last lot of coals dusty. He was now unloading some of the best Wallsend that ever came up the river, and would take care that the next half ton should not have an ounce of small in it.