"I wosn't sech a mug as that, sir," she replied with a faint dash of humor. "When smoke comes out of the chimney of a empty 'ouse the peeler sez, 'Ho, ho!' and in he pops to find out who's done it. Wot'd become of me then, I'd like to know? They'd 'ave made precious short work of me."
"And you have not lit a fire in a stove all the time you have been here."
"Never once, sir."
"How did you manage for coals, Barbara?"
"Well, sir, when I first come, there was a lot of coal in the cellar, and I used it all up. It lasted ever so long, but there was a end to it. Then I begun on the furniture and odd bits of sticks I found inside the house and out. Sometimes when it was dark and rainy I foller the coal wagons, and pick up wot drops from the sacks. Then there's dead branches; I've got 'arf a cupboardful downstairs."
"What time did you come"--I hesitated at the word--"home to-night?"
"Past one, I think, sir. I kep' out late trying to sell my matches, but I 'ad to give it up for a bad job."
"It was you we heard moving about?"
"Did I make a noise, sir? I don't, 'ardly ever, but I s'ppose I wos desp'rate, being so 'ungry, and thinking wot I should do to-morrer for grub. I wosn't long gitting my clothes off, cos I wanted to git to sleep quick and forgit everythink and everybody--everybody but Molly. I'm 'appy when I'm asleep, sir."
"Poor child! Do you mean to tell me, Barbara, that all these years you have never once been found out, that all these years you have come and gone from the house without being seen."