"He wur a bad un!" she cried. "He wur a devil! He wur a devil out an' out. I knowed him an' he knowed me."
Then she bent forward and touched Miss Ffrench's arm.
"Theer wur na a worse un nor a bigger devil nowheer," she said. "An' yo're th' very moral on him."
Miss Ffrench got up and turned toward the door to speak to Mrs. Briarley, who that moment arrived in great haste carrying the baby, out of breath, and stumbling in her tremor at receiving gentle folk company.
"Your visitor has been talking to me," she remarked, her little smile showing itself again. "She says my grandfather was a devil."
She answered all Mrs. Briarley's terrified apologies with the same little smile. She had been passing by and had remembered that the housekeeper needed assistance in some matter and it had occurred to her to come in. That was all, and having explained herself, she went away as she had come.
"Eh!" fretted Mrs. Briarley, "to think o' that theer owd besom talkin' i' that rood to a lady. That's allus th' way wi' her. She'd mak' trouble anywheer. She made trouble enow when she wur young. She wur na no better than she should be then, an' she's nowt so mich better now."
"What's that tha'rt saying?" demanded the Voice. "A noice way that wur fur a lady to go out wi'out so mich as sayin' good-day to a body. She's as loike him as two peas—an' he wur a devil. Here," to Murdoch, "pick up that theer flower she's dropped."
Murdoch turned to the place she pointed out. The
