It was so very fortunate—­so very lucky that dear Mr. Kendal had come home with her, for—­she had said she would let Mrs. Kendal hear, if only that she might be on her guard—­people were so ill-natured—­ there never was such a place for gossip—­not that she heard it from any one but Mrs. Drury, who really now had driven in—­not that she believed it, but to ascertain.—­For Mrs. Drury had been told—­mentioning no names—­oh, no! for fear of making mischief—­she had been told that Mrs. Kendal had actually been into Mr. Kendal’s study, which was always kept locked up, and there she had found something which had distressed her so much that she had gone to Mr. Dusautoy, and by his advice had fled from home to the protection of her brother in Canada.

‘Without waiting for Bluebeard’s asking for the key!  Oh, Maria!’ cried Albinia, in a fit of laughter, while Sophia sat up on the sofa in speechless indignation.

‘You may laugh, Mrs. Kendal, if you please,’ said Maria, with tart dignity; ’I have told you nothing but the truth.  I should have thought for my part, but that’s of no consequence, it was as well to be on one’s guard in a nest of vipers, for Edmund’s sake, if not for your own.’  And as this last speech convulsed Albinia, and rendered her incapable of reply, Miss Meadows became pathetic.  ’I am sure the pains I have taken to trace out and contradict—­and so nervous as grandmamma has been—­“I’m sure, Mrs. Drury,” said I, “that though Edmund Kendal does lock his study door, nobody ever thought anything--the housemaids go in to clean it—­and I’ve been in myself when the whitewashers were about the house—­I’m sure Mrs. Kendal is a most amiable young woman, and you wouldn’t raise reports.”  “No,” she said, “but Mrs. Osborn was positive that Mrs. Kendal was nearly an hour shut up alone in the study the night of Sophy’s accident—­and so sudden,” she said, “the carriage being sent for—­not a servant knew of it—­and then,” she said, “it was always the talk among the girls, that Mr. Kendal kept his study a forbidden place."’

‘Then,’ said Sophia, slowly, as she looked full at her aunt, ’it was the Osborns who dared to say such wicked things.’

’There now, I never meant you to be there.  You ought to be gone to bed, child.  It is not a thing for you to know anything about.’

’I only want to know whether it was the Osborns who invented these stories,’ said Sophy.

‘My dear,’ exclaimed Albinia, ’what can it signify?  They are only a very good joke.  I did not think there had been so much imagination in Bayford.’  And off she went laughing again.

‘They are very wicked,’ said Sophy, ’Aunt Maria, I will know if it was Mrs. Osborn who told the story.’

Sophy’s will was too potent for Miss Meadows, and the admission was extracted in a burst of other odds and ends, in the midst of which Albinia beheld Sophy cross the room with a deliberate, determined step.  Flying after her, she found her in the hall, wrapping herself up.