He nodded his head gravely.
“Oh, it was a fair and lovely darlin’, and so fine and healthy; but my own little girl grew droopy and pined—I’ve had four, and I never reared one. It killed me to see them just fading off and my heart withering along with them. When my little Mary—God rest her!—died, quite sudden, I was nearly crazy, but that other little one was a consolation, and as I lay in the bed I made up my mind I’d keep her for my own. Oh, wasn’t I the wicked woman? I had no scruple. Oh, may the saints pity me! But the little live warm child just caught me by the heart”—her voice rose to a wail of agony; “how could I send her away, and sit again by the empty cradle?”
She came to a pause, fighting for breath and overcome by the violence of her emotion.
“And how did you do it?” he inquired in a low voice.
“I kep’ my own baby well covered up, and the room within dark; and John telegraphed over, and there was a great stir, and a mighty gay little funeral; and no one knew—for young babies is so similar—that it was my own little girlie, I laid in the beautiful white and silver coffin under the flowers.”
“Tell me”—leaning forward as he spoke—“did no one ever suspect you?”
“Sorra a wan, but Mike over beyant at Lota. When he saw the child growing up he would come to the gate there and just stand and look over at her and then at me, in a way that put the fear of death in me. You see, he had worked for her ladyship; he saw the likeness; he saw her walking, living, talking image. Sure, don’t you see it, sir, yourself?”
“Yes, I do,” he asserted gravely.
“And what are you going to do with me and her?” she asked, in a broken voice.