“Your sister knew nothing about it, miss.  I took the box last night and threw it into the dust-hole.  I hope the vermin inside are dead by now—­horrid, odious, disgusting things!”

“Vermin!” cried Diana.  Her great eyes leaped, a ray of pure fire seemed to dart from them.  She looked for a moment as if she meant to strike Simpson, but then, thinking better of it, she turned and rushed like a little fury from the room.  Downstairs, with her heart choking, her breath coming fast, her whole little body palpitating with the most frantic passion, she ran.

The first person she happened to meet was her uncle, Mr. Dolman.  He was coming sleepily in from the garden, for the day was getting intensely hot.  He meant to go to his study to begin to write his sermon for next Sunday.  He did not feel at all inclined to write his sermon, but as it had to be got through somehow, he thought he would devote an hour, or perhaps an hour and a half, to its composition this morning.  When he saw Diana, however, rushing madly through the hall, with her eyes shining, her face white, and her whole little body quivering with excitement, he could not help exclaiming under his breath at her remarkable beauty.

“What a handsome little spitfire!” he said aloud.

“Spitfire, indeed!” said Diana; “it’s you all who is spitfires; it’s not me.  I want to say something to you, big man.”

“Very well, small girl,” answered Mr. Dolman.  “I am willing to listen to you.  What is the matter?”

This was really much more diverting than sitting down to his sermon.

“I want you to have that howid old woman upstairs put in pwison.  I want you to get the perlice, and have her hands tied, and have her took away to pwison.  She has done a murder—­she has killed my—­” But here little Diana’s voice suddenly failed; high as her spirit was, it could not carry her any further.  A sense of absolute loneliness came over her, and her passion ended in a burst of frantic weeping.

And now all might have been well, for Mr. Dolman was a kind-hearted man, and the little child, in her black dress, would have appealed to him, and he would have taken her in his arms and comforted her after a fashion, and matters might never have been so sore and hard again for little Diana, if at that moment Mrs. Dolman had not appeared.  She was walking hastily across the hall with her district-visiting hat on.  Mrs. Dolman’s district-visiting hat was made in the shape of a very large mushroom.  It was simply adorned with a band of brown ribbon, and was not either a becoming or fashionable headgear.

Diana, who had a strong sense of the ludicrous, stopped her tears where her aunt appeared.

“What a poky old thing you is!” she said.

These words enraged Mrs. Dolman.

“William,” she remarked, “what are you doing with that child?  Why, you have taken her in your arms; put her down this minute.  Diana, you are a very naughty little girl.”