"Cyril! Cyril! have not our late troubles shown you that we must judge no one? After what we have undergone I shall never, never give an opinion about anyone again. I am sorry now that I did not behave better to poor Mrs. Vand. When my supposed father was alive I did treat her haughtily. No wonder she disliked me."
"My dear," said Lister, taking her hand, "don't be too hard on yourself. You and your so-called aunt would never have got on well together."
"But I might have been kinder," said Bella, almost crying; "now that she is dead and gone I feel that I might have been kinder."
"How do you know that she is dead and gone?" asked Cyril, in so strange a tone that Bella, dashing the tears from her eyes, looked at him inquiringly. "She is alive," he replied to that mute interrogation.
"Oh, Cyril, I am so glad! Tell me all about it."
"I don't know that I am glad, poor soul," said Lister sadly. "The police are on her track. I didn't want to tell you, Bella, but for the last two days the papers have been full of the hunt after Mrs. Vand."
"Why didn't Dora tell me?"
"I asked her not to. You have had quite enough to bear."
"Well, now that you have told me some, tell me all."
"There isn't much to tell. Some too clever landlady in Bloomsbury suspected a quiet lady lodger. It certainly was Mrs. Vand, but she became suspicious of her landlady and cleared out. Then she was seen at Putney, and afterwards someone noticed her in Hampstead. The papers having been taunting the police about the matter, they'll catch her in the end."