Next morning at breakfast Bob told his aunt that Mrs. Winter had been nurse to Lady Margaret Browning's mother, and she was greatly surprised.
"Well, I never!" she exclaimed, "who'd have thought it! And Mrs. Winter so poor too!"
"Do you think she's very poor?" asked Bob anxiously.
His aunt nodded.
"She told me herself she's only a few shillings a week more than her old-age pension to live on," she said; "it's hard lines for her, because I hear from outsiders that her husband left her a few hundreds—she lent the money to a relative who lost it in his business. If I was she I'd apply to Lady Margaret Browning for help."
"Oh, I don't think she'd like to!" Bob answered quickly, for he realised his kind old friend was not the sort of person to ask charity.
Nevertheless, he quite made up his mind that when he saw Lady Margaret Browning again—he believed he would see her again—that he would tell her all about her dead mother's old nurse.
Bob was kept busy by his aunt that morning, running errands. He was toiling along with a heavy basket filled with vegetables and fruit when he came around a corner upon Tom Smith. He would have passed without speaking, but Tom stood in front of him and stopped him.
"Hulloa; youngster!" was the bully's greeting, followed by the question: "What about that brooch?"
"Well, what about it?" said Bob coldly. Tom gave him a shrewd look. "I suppose you saw the printed bills in the shop windows?" he said inquiringly. "Well—" as Bob nodded—"did you get the reward?"