“It don’t need a witch to tell that it’s a woman,” said Pick; but he was relieved. “That fellow Rowley’s been at me, and one of the ladies round the corner; but they both had so much to say that I got off, and neither the one nor the other found out as I hadn’t a notion what they were talking about,” the old man added, with a chuckle. “It’s some new voice, as far as I can make out, as master has got hold of for the Abbey: and quite right too. Tommy Rowley’s got a pretty little bit of a voice, and he’s only twelve; but some voices goes sooner than others. The ladies thought as it was a woman; but that’s impossible. They were quite in a way. They said it was uneck--some thin’ or other--Dissenting-like, as I took it up--and that the Signor ought to be ashamed of hisself----” “Master?” said Mrs. Purcell, opening her eyes wide; “but I hope you didn’t stand there and hear them say any harm of the Signor?” “They told me as I was to give him good advice,” said Pick, still chuckling; “but all the same, ma’am, I don’t think as Mr. John should keep a thing from his mother. Where’s the young man as owes as much to his mother as that young man owes to you?” “Not to me, to his own deservings; he’s been a lad that has done credit to everyone as has been kind to him, Pick, and never forgets nobody as has been kind to him; but he’s not the young man he was. He’s lost all his smiles and his fun since he had that disappointment. I don’t wish Miss Despard no harm, but I wish she had been a hundred miles from here, and my John had never seen her. Young women have a great deal to answer for,” said Mrs. Purcell, with a sigh. “Young women haven’t much to answer for, so far as I’m concerned; nor master neither, so far as I can see,” said Pick, going off to his work with a comfortable consciousness that, this being the case, it did not matter so much about Mr. John.