more of the odd-come-shorts whom she had not managed
to place out in good situations.

Again a wave of resentment swept over Mrs.
Otway. This was really too much!

"How would such a woman as you describe -- a cook
who has been in a good London place, and who has
lost her health -- work into our -- mine and Rose's --
ways? Why, we should both be afraid of such a
woman! She would impose on us at every turn. If
you only knew, dear Miss Forsyth, how often, in the
last twenty years, I have thanked God -- I say it in
all reverence -- for having sent me my good old Anna!
Think what it has been to me" -- she spoke with a good
deal of emotion -- "to have in my tiny household a
woman so absolutely trustworthy that I could always
go away and leave my child with her, happy in the
knowledge that Rose was as safe with Anna as she
was with me----"

Her voice broke, a lump came into her throat, but
she hurried on: "Don't think that it has all been
perfect -- that I have lain entirely on a bed of roses!
Anna has been very tiresome sometimes; and, as you
know, her daughter, to whom I was really attached,
and whom I regarded more or less as Rose's foster-sister,
made that unfortunate marriage to a worthless
London tradesman. That's the black spot in Anna's
life -- I don't mind telling you that it's been a blacker
spot in mine than I've ever cared to admit, even to
myself. The man's always getting into scrapes, and
having to be got out of them! Why, _you_ once helped
me about him, didn't you? and since then James
Hayley actually had to go to the police about the
man."

[[10]]

p009 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p010w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p011

v?