She would have cried, very likely, if she had been less frightened, but she only winced, with her shoulders up to her ears, and answered in tremulous haste—
“Mr. Fairfield, sure.”
“There’s three Mr. Vairvields: there’s old Mr. Vairvield, there’s Mr. Charles Vairvield, and there’s Mr. Harry Vairvield—you shall speak plain.”
And at each name in her catalogue she twisted the child’s ear with a sharp separate wring.
“Oh, law, ma’am. Please ’m, I mean Mr. Charles Fairfield. I didn’t mean to tell you no story, indeed, my lady.”
“Ho, ho—yes—Charles, Charles—very goot. Now, you tell me how you know Mr. Harry from Mr. Charles?”
“Oh, law, ma’am! oh, law! oh, ma’am, dear! sure, you won’t pull it no more, good lady, please—my ear’s most broke,” gasped the girl, who felt the torture beginning again.
“You tell truth. How do you know Mr. Charles from Mr. Harry?”
“Mr. Charles has bigger eyes, ma’am, and Mr. Harry has lighter hair, and a red face, please ’m, and Mr. Charles’s face is brown, and he talks very quiet-like, and Mr. Harry talks very loud, and he’s always travellin’ about a-horseback, and Mr. Charles is the eldest son, and the little child they’re lookin’ for is to be the Squire o’ Wyvern.”
The interrogator here gave her a hard pinch by the ear, perhaps without thinking of it, for she said nothing for a minute nearly, and the girl remained with her head buried between her shoulders, and her eyes wide open, staring straight up where she conjectured her examiner’s face might be.