Hilliard’s interest waxed.

“Then,” pursued Mrs. Brewer, “the next sister to Eve, Laura her name was, went to Birmingham, into a sweetstuff shop, and that was the last ever seen or heard of her.  She wasn’t a girl to be depended upon, and I never thought she’d come to good, and whether she’s alive or dead there’s no knowing.  Eve took it to heart, that she did.  And not six months after, the other girl had the ’sipelas, and she died, and just as they was carrying her coffin out of the house, who should come up but her father!  He’d been away for nearly two years, just sending a little money now and then, and he didn’t even know the girl had been ailing.  And when he saw the coffin, it took him so that he fell down just like a dead man.  You wouldn’t have thought it, but there’s no knowing what goes on in people’s minds.  Well, if you’ll believe it, from that day he was so changed we didn’t seem to know him.  He turned quite religious, and went regular to chapel, and has done ever since; and he wouldn’t touch a drop of anything, tempt him who might.  It was a case of conversion, if ever there was one.

“So there remained only Eve and her brother?”

“Yes.  He was a steady lad, Tom Madeley, and never gave his sister much trouble.  He earns his thirty shillings a week now.  Well, and soon after she saw her father going on all right, Eve left home.  I don’t wonder at it; it wasn’t to be expected she could forgive him for all the harm and sorrows he’d caused.  She went to Birmingham for a few months, and then she came back one day to tell us she’d got a place in London.  And she brought that photo to give us to remember her by.  But, as I said, it isn’t good enough.”

“Does she seem to be happier now?”

“She hasn’t wrote more than once or twice, but she’s doing well, and whatever happens she’s not the one to complain.  It’s a blessing she’s always had her health.  No doubt she’s made friends in London, but we haven’t heard about them.  Martha was hoping she’d have come for Christmas, but it seems she couldn’t get away for long enough from business.  I’d tell you her address, but I don’t remember it.  I’ve never been in London myself.  Martha knows it, of course.  She might look in to-night, and if she does I’ll ask her.”

Hilliard allowed this suggestion to pass without remark.  He was not quite sure that he desired to know Miss Madeley’s address.

But later in the evening, when, after walking for two or three hours about the cold, dark roads, he came in to have his supper and go to bed, Mrs. Brewer smilingly offered him a scrap of paper.

“There,” she said, “that’s where she’s living.  London’s a big place, and you mayn’t be anywhere near, but if you happened to walk that way, we should take it kindly if you’d just leave word that we’re always glad to hear from her, and hope she’s well.”

With a mixture of reluctance and satisfaction the young man took the paper, glanced at it, and folded it to put in his pocket.  Mrs. Brewer was regarding him, and he felt that his silence must seem ungracious.