"Well--hum!--yes, I've seen her." And here Seth rubbed his forehead, denoting that he meant he had seen her in his mind's eye--a salve to his conscience.
"Where does she live?" asked Sally, whom it was difficult to stop, when she commenced to make inquiries on an interesting theme.
"She lives in--hum!--in Fairyland."
"Oh, where's that?"
"Don't ask any more questions. You'll see a bit of it to-morrow."
[CHAPTER XVI.]
The following day a sensation was created in Rosemary Lane by the circumstance of Seth Dumbrick's stall being closed, and by a written notice pasted outside, to the effect that he might be expected to return in the course of two or three weeks.
"From the day as Seth Dumbrick give that party to the children," said Mrs. Preedy, holding forth in front of the cellar to a knot of eager listeners, "down in that cellar"--with finger ominously pointing--"from that day I begun to suspect him, and to feel sure as there was something wrong I says to him on that very day, Strange things is often done down in cellars,' says I; and then I told him that I wouldn't let my Jane go to his party unless I were invited, no, not if he filled my apron with diamings. 'Perhaps,' says I, with mind full of misbegivings, 'perhaps you've got ghosts and skiletons down in your cellar, Mr. Dumbrick;' and as true as I'm a living woman, he says to me upon that, 'My cellar is full of ghosts, Mrs. Preedy,' says he; 'my cellar is full of ghosts,' he says."
This narrative imparted a more intense interest to the position of affairs, and imagination ran riot on the contents of the cellar, which became gradually filled with the bones and limbs of murdered persons--Seth Dumbrick's victims, who had been artfully decoyed down the steps and made away with.
"And it shows the wickedness of mankind," said one woman, especially disposed to the horrible, "to think of the way he's kept it secret all this time."