“Heard! What is there to hear?” he said impatiently.
“Jane has not been with me for a year.”
“What has become of her?”
“Indeed I don’t know. She remained with me three months after you left, and then suddenly disappeared. She must have got tired of a life so different from that she had been accustomed to lead, and determined to go back to her street life.”
“I am deeply grieved to hear it,” said Captain Barnes. “I have anticipated meeting her with so much pleasure. And have you never seen her since?”
“Never.”
“I thought you might accidentally have met her in the street.”
“No.”
“Had she improved while she did stay?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Merton, with hesitation, “that is, a little. She was not quite so wild and rude as at first; but I don’t think she would ever have made up the deficiencies of her early training.”