"Yes. I can tell you at once. Her foster-father used to be a bailiff of my father's in the good old days when money wasn't so hard to get, and even land seemed to yield a richer harvest. The old man died at his work, and as he was a widower, with this little adopted daughter living with him, he begged Father to see that she came to no harm. And Father promised. And when she grew old enough, he gave her work in the house. Sort of secretary--Mother's help, you know. But when he remarried, Paula changed all that, and took her for her own sort of companion-lady's-maid. I believe she would have left us before now, after the treatment she has had, if it hadn't been for Father being her guardian, so to speak. But none of us can ever forgive Paula for the way she has treated her. It's disgraceful." "And yet your father never complained?" "My father never _saw_. But the girl has been made a pack-horse from the minute Paula set her foot in this house. She seemed to have marked her down for her own, and Johanna has had to suffer in consequence. Such a nice little thing, too! It's common knowledge that she is engaged to Mr. Tavish--though we've heard nothing definitely. But it will be an excellent match. More in her own station of life; and they're both such dears.... Anything else, Mr. Deland?" "Nothing else, thanks." "Then I'll be off. And back again in twenty minutes. And in the meantime, Mr. Deland, you won't--you won't think too hard of my Angus will you? Even if he had done such a terrible thing whatever reason would he have had to do it?" "Has he any debts, Miss Duggan?" She laughed a little and shrugged her shoulders. "Heavens, yes! Heaps of them. That was what Father had against him. Father used to say that a poor man should own nothing, because there was little chance of paying it back. But so have I, for the matter of that. Over a hundred pounds--and bridge debts. But it's my only recreation, Mr. Deland, and I can easily pay it back, so that it's nobody else's business, is it? But I wouldn't have Paula know for worlds! She'd make my life misery."