Nor was the girl beside her, who revealed sufficient similarity of features to announce herself the daughter of the widow. There was the same fresh complexion, full red lips and hard blue eyes. But the hair was of a golden color, and fashionably dressed. The young woman--she likewise was not a lady--was also in black. "This," said Pash, indicating the elder woman, who smiled, "is Mrs. Lemuel Krill." "The wife of the man who called himself Aaron Norman," went on the widow; "and this," she indicated her daughter, "is his heiress." CHAPTER XI A CUCKOO IN THE NEST Paul looked from the fresh-colored woman who spoke so smoothly and so firmly to the apish lawyer hunched in his chair with a sphinx-like look on his wrinkled face. For the moment, so taken aback was he by this astounding announcement, that he could not speak. The younger woman stared at him with her hard blue eyes, and a smile played round her full lips. The mother also looked at him in an engaging way, as though she rather admired his youthful comeliness in spite of his well-brushed, shabby apparel. "I don't know what you mean," said Beecot at length, "Mr. Pash?" The lawyer aroused himself to make a concise statement of the case. "So far as I understand," he said in his nervous, irritable way, "these ladies claim to be the wife and daughter of Lemuel Krill, whom we knew as Aaron Norman." "And I think by his real name also," said the elder woman in her deep, smooth contralto voice, and with the display of an admirable set of teeth. "The bills advertising the reward, and stating the fact of the murder, bore my late husband's real name." "Norman was not your husband, madam," cried Paul, indignantly. "I agree with you, sir. Lemuel Krill was my husband. I saw in the newspapers, which penetrate even into the quiet little Hants village I live in, that Aaron Norman had been murdered. I never thought he was the man who had left me more than twenty years ago with an only child to bring up. But the bills offering the reward assured me that Norman and Krill are one and the same man. Therefore," she drew herself up and looked piercingly at the young man, "I have come to see after the property. I understand from the papers that my daughter is an heiress to millions." "Not millions," said Pash, hastily. "The newspapers have exaggerated the amount. Five thousand a year, madam, and it is left to Sylvia." "Who is Sylvia?" asked Mrs. Krill, in the words of Shakespeare's song. "She is the daughter of Mr. Norman," said Paul, quickly, "and is engaged to marry me." Mrs. Krill's eyes travelled over his shabby suit from head to foot, and then back again from foot to head. She glanced sideways at her companion, and the girl laughed in a hard, contemptuous manner. "I fear you will be disappointed in losing a rich wife, sir," said the elder woman, sweetly. "I have not lost the money yet," replied Paul, hotly. "Not that I care for the money."