A successful venture

by Ellen Douglas Deland

But for the first time in her life, Victoria turned a deaf ear to Sophy’s lamentations, and the child fled upstairs to Honor for consolation. She found her eldest sister in her own room. She was standing in the middle of the floor and she was directly confronted by B. Lafferty, who, with her hands on her hips, was haranguing her young mistress with all the eloquence at her command.

Sophy forgot her own grievance in wonder as to what Blanch could be talking about, and sidling up to Honor, she dried her tears and listened, her big brown eyes fastened upon the crimson countenance of the housemaid.

“I tell yer, I’m agoin’ ter go this very minute!” said Blanch. “I ain’t agoin’ ter stay where insults is heaped upon me. I’ve put up with the imperence of that proud an’ hotty girl long enough. Sayin’ she’s allus lived on Beacon Street an’ ain’t never lived in the country afore! An’ has allus been in the house with three others, a cook, a laundress, an’ an upstairs girl! An’ now she an’ yer aunt be afther sayin’ as it was me as let in the burglars, an’ me as sound asleep as anything an’ adreamin’ o’ the ould counthry, an niver a word did I hear of any burglars till I come down this mornin’ an’ was agoin’ ter set the table for breakfast, an’ lo an’ behold, all the drawers an’ the closets was astandin’ open an’ I not knowin’ at all what it all mint. An’ yer know yerself as Miss Vic’s windy and doore was astandin’ wide open an’ the burglar walked in that way as sure as anything, an’ they be afther sayin’ as it was me or young Dave Carney as let ’em in, as honest a young feller as iver I seen. Oh, I tell yer—”

“Just wait a minute, Blanch,” interposed Honor. “I do not think that you had anything to do with the robbery. Neither do my sisters, and we are the ones to whom you are accountable. If you go away in the next train, as you threaten to do, you will make others suspect you as well as my aunt. It will look exactly as if you were afraid of being caught and were running off. The detective who is coming out this morning will certainly say that you had something to do with it if he finds that you have gone, whereas if you stay quietly here and go about your work as usual, no one will dream of accusing you.”

There was an amount of common sense in this statement which B. Lafferty, excited though she was, could not fail to recognize.

“Very well,” said she, “I’ll stay till termorrow, but longer than that I couldn’t put up with that girl from Beacon Street. It’s long enough I’ve been afther standin’ it, and me keepin’ stiddy company with a widder man an’ havin’ the chance to git married any day I’ll set!”

And so saying she departed to the kitchen, leaving her mistress, who had recently been having a discussion with her aunt, strongly of the opinion that residents of Beacon Street were indeed difficult to live with.

It was not long before Roger Madison returned, bringing with him a detective. The man carefully examined the premises, took a list of the missing articles with an exact description of them all, and interviewed each member of the household.

There seemed to be no doubt that the person whom Katherine had heard in the shrubbery had entered through the window in Victoria’s room. Although Mrs. Wentworth Ward named her suspicions of both Blanch and Dave Carney to the detective, he did not seem inclined to agree with her in regard to the former. Honor had been given a very good account of the Irishwoman’s honesty when she engaged her, and there had been nothing since she lived with them to cause her to doubt it.

As to Carney, that was a different matter. When the detective questioned him, he became very much confused and gave most unsatisfactory replies; and yet it seemed impossible that a boy who was familiar with the house, and knew that two members of the family occupied the room over the dining-room, should have chosen that means of entering. The detective could determine nothing as yet.