py one for me.'

Lydia went down to the door and watched the two till they were lost in
darkness. Then she returned to her sister with a sigh of gladness. For
the moment she had no trouble of her own.

Upon days of festival, kept in howsoever quiet and pure a spirit, there
of necessity follows depression; all mirth is unnatural to the
reflective mind, and even the unconscious suffer a mysterious penalty
when they have wrested one whole day from fate. On the Saturday Lydia
had no work to go to, and the hours dragged. In the course of the
morning she went out to make some purchases. She was passing Mrs.
Bower's without intention of entering, when Mary appeared in the
doorway and beckoned her. Mrs. Bower was out; Mary had been left in
charge of the shop.

'You were asking me about Mr. Ackroyd,' she said, when they had gone
into the parlour. 'Would you like to know something I heard about him
last night?'

Lydia knew that it was something disagreeable; Mary's air of
discharging a duty sufficiently proved that.

'What is it?' she asked coldly.

'They were talking about him here when I came back last night. He's
begun to go about with that girl Totty Nancarrow.'

Lydia cast down her eyes. Mary keeping silence, she said:

'Well, what if he has?'

'I think it's right you should know, on Thyrza's account.'

'Thyrza has nothing to do with Mr. Ackroyd; you know that, Mary.'

'But there's something else. He's begun to drink, Lydia. Mr. Raggles
saw him in a public-house somewhere last night, and he was quite tipsy.'

Lydia said nothing. She held a market bag before her, and her white
knuckles proved how tightly she clutched the handles.

'You remember what I once said,' Mary continued. There was absolutely
no malice in her tone, but mere satisfaction in proving that the
premises whence her conclusions had been drawn were undeniably sound.
She was actuated neither by personal dislike of Ackroyd nor by
jealousy; but she could not resist this temptation of illustrating her
principles by such a noteworthy instance. 'Now wasn't I right, Lydia?'

Lydia looked up with hot cheeks.

'I don't believe it!' she said vehemently. 'Who's Mr. Raggles? How do
you know he tells the truth?--And what is it to me, whether it's true
or not?'

'You were so sure that it made no difference what any one believed,
Lydia,' said the other, with calm persistency.

'And I say the same still, and I always will say it? You're _glad_ when
anybo