"Who told you?"
"I read it in the paper a lodger lends me sometimes. Mr. Sidney's out of work!"
"At present—for a day or two."
"He has heard of something that will better him?"
"He will—in a day or two."
"And you—you're out of work too, sir?"
"That confounded Ann has told you——"
"Not a word, sir—but I have had a habit of looking for you, when you passed the house where I lodged, twice a-day—and I couldn't settle down, or feel comfortable, until you had passed. And when you did not come, I knew what had happened."
"Still full of curiosity, Mattie," said Mr. Hinchford, feeling the tears in his eyes at this evidence of Mattie's interest in him.
"Curious about all of you," she said, with a comprehensive gesture; "I don't feel so far away when I know what has happened, or is happening. And wanting to know the worst, or the best of everything, I come like an inquisitive little body, as I have always been, to take you by surprise like this!"