“No, I’ve heard nothing,” I exclaimed. “What do you mean?”
“’Bout master’s having failed, and a set o’ wretches,”—here she glanced at the dirty-looking man—“coming and robbing him of his business, and his house, and his furniture, and everything a’most he’s got.”
“No, no, Sally, I have heard nothing. But are they well?”
“Oh, yes, as well as folks can be as is being robbed by folks who come sitting in all the chairs with hankychers over their heads, and going to sleep all over the place.”
“But where are they?” I cried; “upstairs?”
“Upstairs? No,” cried Sally. “They’re down at the little cottage in Back Lane, where old Mrs Wigley used to live.”
“I’ll run down at once,” I cried. “Come along, Tom!” I did not look back, for I was intent upon my task; and if I had I should have had no satisfaction, for Tom had stayed behind, as he afterwards said, to look after old master’s property; but I never believed that tale for several reasons, one being that Tom looked shamefaced and awkward as he said it, and circumstances afterwards tended to show that he had some other reason.
The old cottage named was one that I well remembered, and my spirit seemed to sink lower and lower as I neared the place; for it was terrible to think of those whom I had left, if not in affluence, at least in a comfortable position in life, brought down to so sad and impecunious a state, suffering real poverty, and with the home of so many years now in the broker’s hands.
Then I felt a wave of high spirits come over me, as it were, to hurl me down and then lift me and carry me on and on, till I literally set off and ran down turning after turning, till I came to the little whitewashed cottage where my father and mother had their abode.
I half-paused for a moment, and then tapping lightly, raised the latch and entered.