Mr Brown smiled grimly, but made no answer. “Have you got anything else to tell me about her? Did she ever write to her mother? Do you know what regiment it is, or where it was at that time?” said the attorney. “Think what you are about, and tell me clearly--what year was she married, and where were you at the time?” Nancy grew nervous under this close questioning. She lost her self-possession and all her fancied importance. “We were in the Isle o’ Man, where the Christians come from. I was born there myself. Missis’s friends was mostly there. It was by her husband’s side she belonged to Carlingford. It was about a two miles out of Douglas--a kind of a farmhouse. It was the year--the year--I was fifteen,” said Nancy, faltering. “And how old are you now?” said the inexorable questioner, who had taken out his memorandum-book. Nancy dropped into a chair and began to sob. “It’s hard on a person bringing things back,” said Nancy,--“and to think if she should actually turn up again just as she was! As for living in the house with her, I couldn’t think of such a thing. Sally Christian, or some poor-spirited person might do it, but not me as am used to be my own mistress,” cried Nancy, with increasing agitation. “She had the temper of ---- oh! she was her mother’s temper. Dear, dear! to think as she might be alive, and come back to put all wrong! It was in the year ’eight--that’s the year it was.” “Then you didn’t think she would come back,” said Mr Brown. “It’s a matter o’ five-and-thirty years; and not knowing even her name, nor the number of the regiment, nor nothing--as I don’t,” said Nancy, cautiously; “and never hearing nothing about her, what was a person to think? And if it’s just Phœbe Thomson you’re inquiring after, and don’t say nothing about the marriage nor the regiment, you may seek long enough before you find her,” said Nancy, with a glance of what was intended to be private intelligence between herself and her questioner, “and all correct to the will.” Mr Brown put up his memorandum-book sharply in his pocket. “Bring me the keys. Look here, bring me _all_ the keys,” he said. “What’s in this other room, eh? It was her bedroom, I suppose. Hollo, what’s all this?” For all Nancy’s precautions had not been able to ward off this catastrophe. He pushed into the room she had left to admit him, where all her treasures were exhibited. His quick eye glanced round in an instant, and understood it. Trembling as Nancy was with new alarms, she had still strength to make one struggle. “Missis’s things fall to me,” said Nancy, half in assertion, half in entreaty; “that’s how it always is; the servant gets the lady’s wardrobe--the servant as has nursed her and done for her, when there’s no daughter--that’s always understood.” “Bring me the keys,” said Mr Brown.