"Oh, please sir, I don't know," said Sarah, who was very near crying. "He's gone out for a walk, that's all. Oh, Mr Wentworth, don't look at me so dreadfully, and I'll tell you hall," cried the frightened girl, "_hall_--as true as if I was on my oath. He 'as a taking way with him," said poor Sarah, to whom the sulky and shabby rascal was radiant still with the fascinating though faded glory of "a gentleman"--"and he aint one as has been used to regular hours; and seeing as he was a friend of yours, I knew as hall was safe, Mr Wentworth; and oh, sir, if you'll not tell missis, as might be angry. I didn't mean no harm; and knowing as he was a friend of yours, I let him have the key of the little door." Here Sarah put her apron to her eyes; she did not cry much into it, or wet it with her tears--but under its cover she peeped at Mr Wentworth, and, encouraged by his looks, which did not seem to promise any immediate catastrophe, went on with her explanation. "He's been and took a walk often in the morning," said Sarah, with little gasps which interrupted her voice, "and come in as steady as steady, and nothing happened. He's gone for a walk now, poor gentleman. Them as goes out first thing in the morning, can't mean no harm, Mr Wentworth. If it was at night, it would be different," said the apologetic Sarah. "He'll be in afore we've done our breakfast in the kitchen; that's his hour, for I always brings him a cup of coffee. If you hadn't been up not till _your_ hour, sir, you'd never have known nothing about it;" and here even Mrs Hadwin's housemaid looked sharply in the Curate's face. "I never knew you so early, sir, not since I've been here," said Sarah; and though she was a partisan of Mr Wentworth, it occurred even to Sarah that perhaps, after all, Elsworthy might be right. "If he comes in let me know immediately," said the Curate; and he went to his study and shut himself in, to think it all over with a sense of being baited and baffled on every side. As for Sarah, she went off in great excitement to discuss the whole business with the cook, tossing her head as she went. "Rosa Elsworthy, indeed!" said Sarah to herself, thinking her own claims to admiration quite as well worth considering--and Mr Wentworth had already lost one humble follower in Grange Lane.