r conscience directs you, Miss Tabby, no matter how
people may look upon you."

"Very well, then, ma'am; for my conscience do order me to speak! Oh,
Miss Sybil! I have knowed you ever since you was a baby in my arms, and
I can't bear to have you so deceived and imposed upon by that there
treacherous, ungrateful White Cat!"

"White Cat?" echoed Sybil, in perplexity.

"Yes, Miss Sybil, that red-headed, false-hearted White Cat, as you took
into your house and home, for to beguile and corrupt your own true
husband!"

With a gasp and a suppressed cry, Sybil sank into her seat.

Miss Tabby, too full of her subject to notice Sybil's agitation,
continued:

"No sooner had your carriage left the door this morning, Miss Sybil,
than that there White Cat comes tipping on her tiptoes out of her room,
in a long loose dressing-gown, with her hair all down, in a way as no
real lady would ever be seen out of her own chamber, and she tips, tips,
tips into the drawing-room, where she knows Mr. Berners is alone, and
laying on the sofa!"

With a powerful effort Sybil controlled her violent emotion, held
herself still, and listened.

"And that was bad enough, Miss Sybil! but that was nothing to what
followed!" sighed Miss Tabby, wiping another tear from the end of her
nose.

"What followed?" echoed Sybil, in an expiring voice.

"What followed, ma'am, was this: but to make you understand, I must tell
you what I ought to a told you at the start, which is how it happened as
I seen her tip, tip, tip, on her tiptoes to the drawing-room, just for
all the world like a cat after cream. Well, I was up here, in this very
room where I am now, a sorting out of your fine things as come up from
the wash, and I found one o' _her_ lace handkerchers among yourn, fotch
up by mistake. So I jes took it and went down them back stairs as leads
from this room down to hern, to give her back her handkercher; when jes
as I got into her room, I seen her slip outen the other door leading
into the hall. So after her I goes, to give her her handkercher--which I
thought it was best to give it intor her own hands, than to put it
anywhere in her room, because I didn't know nothing about this forring
nuss o' hern; and you know yourself, ma'am, as we ought to be cautious
in dealing with strangers."

"Yes, yes! Go on! go on!" gasped Sybil.

"Well, ma'am, she flitted through them passages too fast for me, jes as
if she was afraid o' being caught afore she got out