e
gentleman, rising and opening the door of an inner room, 'we had better
confer together. Miss Brass is here, gentlemen.' Mr Garland and the
Notary walked in, looking very grave; and, drawing up two chairs, one
on each side of the single gentleman, formed a kind of fence round the
gentle Sarah, and penned her into a corner. Her brother Sampson under
such circumstances would certainly have evinced some confusion or
anxiety, but she--all composure--pulled out the tin box, and calmly
took a pinch of snuff.

'Miss Brass,' said the Notary, taking the word at this crisis, 'we
professional people understand each other, and, when we choose, can say
what we have to say, in very few words. You advertised a runaway
servant, the other day?'

'Well,' returned Miss Sally, with a sudden flush overspreading her
features, 'what of that?'

'She is found, ma'am,' said the Notary, pulling out his
pocket-handkerchief with a flourish. 'She is found.'

'Who found her?' demanded Sarah hastily.

'We did, ma'am--we three. Only last night, or you would have heard
from us before.'

'And now I have heard from you,' said Miss Brass, folding her arms as
though she were about to deny something to the death, 'what have you
got to say? Something you have got into your heads about her, of
course. Prove it, will you--that's all. Prove it. You have found
her, you say. I can tell you (if you don't know it) that you have
found the most artful, lying, pilfering, devilish little minx that was
ever born.--Have you got her here?' she added, looking sharply round.

'No, she is not here at present,' returned the Notary. 'But she is
quite safe.'

'Ha!' cried Sally, twitching a pinch of snuff out of her box, as
spitefully as if she were in the very act of wrenching off the small
servant's nose; 'she shall be safe enough from this time, I warrant
you.'

'I hope so,' replied the Notary. 'Did it occur to you for the first
time, when you found she had run away, that there were two keys to your
kitchen door?'

Miss Sally took another pinch, and putting her head on one side, looked
at her questioner, with a curious kind of spasm about her mouth, but
with a cunning aspect of immense expression.

'Two keys,' repeated the Notary; 'one of which gave her the
opportunities of roaming through the house at nights when you supposed
her fast locked up, and of overhearing confidential
consultations--among others, that particular conference, to be
descri