“And her other name?”

His tone betrayed his suspicions.  Mrs. Higgs shrugged her shoulders.

“What does that matter to you?  She is your half-sister, but I don’t suppose you wish to claim relationship?”

“Does she know—­anything?”

“Something, perhaps.  Not too much, I think.  But it doesn’t matter.  She is a weak, namby-pamby creature, and I’m sick of the sight of her white face.  So I’ve got rid of her.”

“How?”

“I’ve given her notice to quit.  I don’t expect her back again.”

“And aren’t you afraid that she may give information?”

“Ah!  Your solicitude is for yourself, eh?  No, she’ll hold her tongue for her own sake.”  And Mrs. Higgs’s features relaxed into a menacing grin.  “She’s seen enough of me to know she must be careful!”

Dudley moved restlessly.

“Isn’t it rough on the girl to bring her up like this?  In this hole, among these human vermin?  She seems to have some decent instincts.”

Mrs. Higgs frowned.

“She was brought up as well as she had any right to expect,” said she, shortly; “educated fairly well into the bargain.  She has not had much to complain of.”

Dudley made no answer to this for some minutes, and during this time Mrs. Higgs kept him steadily under observation, not a movement of his hands, a change of his expression, escaping her.  At last he looked at her, and seemed to be struck by something in her face.  He put his fingers upon the handle of the door as he turned to go.

“Well,” said he—­his voice sounded hollow, cold—­“I have said what I came to say.  I need not stay here any longer.  I don’t wish to meet any of your friends.”

Mrs. Higgs got slowly to her feet.

“My friends!” cried she, angrily.  “My friends!  They’ve done you no harm, at any rate; while your friends come spying round the place, poking their noses into business which is none of theirs.”

Dudley’s hand dropped to his side.

“Do you mean Max Wedmore?” said he, earnestly.  “Why, he is the son of the man who has been a father to me, who brought me up, who saved me from becoming the outcast that poor girl is—­”

Mrs. Higgs interrupted him fiercely.

“That’ll do.  I’m sick of the very name of Wedmore.  They’ve had their own interests to serve, whatever they’ve done, depend upon it.  And if he comes fooling round here again, I’ll treat him as you—­”

Dudley broke in sharply, stopping her as her voice was growing loud and her gestures threatening.  After a short pause, during which she watched him as keenly as ever, he asked, in a hoarse whisper: 

“What did you do with—­him?  Did anybody help you—­any of your friends here?  Or did you—­”

Mrs. Higgs cut him short with an ugly laugh.  At the mention of the dead man her face had changed, and a strange gleam of mingled cunning and ferocity came into her small, light eyes.