"We certainly owe a duty to those who were once our neighbours," assented Miss Spraggs.

"Do you remember her?" asked Mrs Devitt of her husband.

"Of course I do, now I come to think of it," he replied.

"What was she like?"

He paused for a moment or two before replying.

"She'd reddy sort of hair and queer eyes. She was a fine little girl, but a fearful tomboy," said Devitt.

"Pretty, then!" exclaimed Mrs Devitt, as she glanced apprehensively at her step-daughter.

"She was then. It was her hair that did it," answered her husband.

"H'm!" came from his wife.

"The pretty child of to-day is the plain girl of to-morrow" commented Miss Spraggs.