o put into words the question that was in his mind.

"That got into trouble some years ago, you mean," said Mrs. Trent,
lifting her face from her hands, and trying to control her trembling
voice. "Yes, I mean him. I know all about the story. He got into
trouble, and he's gone from bad to worse ever since. I've done my best
for him, but it doesn't seem as if I could do much more now."

"Why?"

"He's been ill--I think he's had an accident--but I don't rightly know
what's been the matter with him. Mr. Brooke, sir, I hope you'll believe
me in what I say. When I came here first I didn't know that you were
friends with his sister and his brother, or I wouldn't have come near
the place. And when I found it out I'd got fond of Miss Lesley, and
thought it would be no harm to stay."

"But what--what on earth--made you take a situation as ladies'-maid at
all?" cried Caspar, pulling his beard in his perplexity, as he listened
to her story.

"I wanted to earn money. _He_ could not work--and I could not bear to
see him want."

"_Could_ not work? Was it not a matter of the will? He could have worked
if he had wished to work," said Mr. Brooke, rather sternly. "That
Francis Trent should let his wife go out as----"

"Oh, well, it was work I was used to," said Francis Trent's wife,
patiently. "I'd been in service when I was a girl, and knew something
about it. And it was honest work. There's plenty of ways of earning
money which are worse than being a servant in your house, and to Miss
Lesley, too."

Lesley's words came back to Caspar's mind. She had had "faith" in
Kingston's attachment, and her faith seemed now to be justified. Women's
instincts, as Caspar acknowledged to himself, are in some ways certainly
juster than those of men.

"Is he not strong? Is there no sort of work that he can do?" he
demanded, with asperity. "If you had come to me at the beginning and
told me who you were, I might have found something for him. It is not
right that his wife should be waiting upon my daughter. Tell me what he
can do."

"I don't think he can do much now," was Mary Trent's answer. "He's very
much broken down. I daresay you wouldn't know him if you saw him. I
don't think he _could_ do a day's work, so there's all the more reason
that I should work for both."

She spoke truly enough as regarded the present; but, by a suppression of
the truth which was almost heroic she concealed the fact that for many
years Francis had been able but