"In 1839," said Patty, "she must have been a girl, a child, and living at Bradenham _at home_. Think of it, Elizabeth--with a mother loving her and petting her as she did us. She was twenty-five when she married; she must have been about sixteen when that Bible was given to her--ever so much younger than any of us are now. _She_ lived in those beautiful rooms with the gold Spanish leather on the walls--_she_ danced in that long gallery with the painted windows and the slippery oak floor and the thirty-seven family portraits all in a row--no doubt she rode about herself with those hunting parties in the winter, and rowed and skated on the lake--I can imagine it, what a life it must have been. Can't you see her, before she grew stout and careworn, and her bright hair got dull, and her pretty hands rough with hard work--young, and lovely, and happy, and petted by everybody--wearing beautiful clothes, and never knowing what it was to have to do anything for herself? I can. And it seems dreadful to think that she had to remember all that, living as she did afterwards. If only he had made it up to her!--but I don't think he did, Elizabeth--I don't think he did. He used to be so cross to her sometimes. Oh, bless her, bless her! Why didn't she tell _us_, so that _we_ could have done more to comfort her?" "I don't think she ever repented," said Elizabeth, who remembered more about her mother than Patty could do. "She did it because she loved him better than Bradenham and wealth and her own personal comfort; and she loved him like that always, even when he was cross. Poor father! No wonder he was cross!" "Why didn't he go back--for her sake, if not for ours--when he saw the advertisements? Elizabeth, my idea is that the death of his brother gave a permanent shock to his brain. I think he could never have been quite himself afterwards. It was a sort of mania with him to disconnect himself from everything that could suggest the tragedy--to get as far away as possible from any association with it." "I think so, too," said Elizabeth. Thus they talked by the kitchen window until the kettle bubbled on the stove; and then, recalled to the passing hour and their own personal affairs, they collected cups and saucers, sugar-basin and milk-jug, and cut bread and butter for the afternoon repast. Just as their preparations were completed, Eleanor came flying along the passage from the sitting-room. "They have found a secret drawer," she cried in an excited whisper. "At least not a drawer, but a double partition that seems to have been glued up; and Mr. Brion is sure, by the dull sound of the wood, that there are things in it. Come and see!"