“Made her dresses, did she?” she repeated. “I don’t think. She didn’t hardly know how to wear a thimble, she didn’t. She wouldn’t have sat down to a job of sewing, not for no person on earth she wouldn’t.”
“Then who did the household mending?”
“Yours truly. Anything that was done I had to do.”
“But not the clothes, surely? Who darned Mr. Berlyn’s socks, for instance?”
“Yours truly. I tell you Mrs. Berlyn wouldn’t have touched a sock or a bit of wool not to save her life.”
This was a piece of unexpected luck. French turned away.
“You are a good girl,” he declared. “Would half a sovereign be of any use to you?”
Miss Johnston left him in no doubt on the point.
“Very well,” he went on. “You come down to the hotel after dinner to-night and ask for me. I want you to mend some clothes and socks for me. Or rather,” he paused, “I have to come up in this direction after lunch to-day in any case, and I’ll bring them.”
No object in advertising the lines on which he was working, he thought. The less that was known of his researches, the more hope there was of their proving fruitful.