"There ain't no question of starving. Such as her don't starve. As long as it lasts, they've the best of eating and drinking,--only too much of it. There's prisons; let 'em go there if they means repentance. But they never does,--never, till there ain't nobody to notice 'em any longer; and by that time they're mostly thieves and pickpockets." "And you would do nothing to save your own husband's sister from such a fate?" "What business had she to be sister to any honest man? Think of what she's been and done to my children, who wouldn't else have had nobody to be ashamed of. There never wasn't one of the Hugginses who didn't behave herself;--that is of the women," added Mrs. George, remembering the misdeeds of a certain drunken uncle of her own, who had come to great trouble in a matter of horseflesh. "And now, Mr. Fenwick, let me beg that there mayn't be another word about her. I don't know nothing of such women, nor what is their ways, and I don't want. I never didn't speak a word to such a one in my life, and I certainly won't begin under my own roof. People knows well enough what's good for them to do and what isn't without being dictated to by a clergyman. You'll excuse me, Mr. Fenwick; but I'll just make bold to say as much as that. Good morning, Mr. Fenwick." In the yard, standing close by the gig, he met the farmer again. "You didn't find she'd be of your way of thinking, Muster Fenwick?" "Not exactly, Mr. Brattle." "I know'd she wouldn't. The truth is, Muster Fenwick, that young women as goes astray after that fashion is just like any sick animal, as all the animals as ain't comes and sets upon immediately. It's just as well, too. They knows it beforehand, and it keeps 'em straight." "It didn't keep poor Carry straight." "And, by the same token, she must suffer, and so must we all. But, Muster Fenwick, as far as ten or fifteen pounds goes, if it can be of use--" But the Vicar, in his indignation, repudiated the offer of money, and drove himself back to Salisbury with his heart full of sorrow at the hardness of the world. What this woman had been saying to him was only what the world had said to her,--the world that knows so much better how to treat an erring sinner than did Our Saviour when on earth. He went with his sad news to Mrs. Stiggs's house, and then made terms for Carry's board and lodging, at any rate, for a fortnight. And he said much to the girl as to the disposition of her time. He would send her books, and she was to be diligent in needle-work on behalf of the Stiggs family. And then he begged her to go to the daily service in the cathedral,--not so much because he thought that the public worship was necessary for her, as that thus she would be provided with a salutary employment for a portion of her day. Carry, as she bade him farewell, said very little. Yes; she would stay with Mrs. Stiggs. That was all that she did say. CHAPTER XLII. MR. QUICKENHAM, Q.C. [Illustration]