“That’s all stuff!” said Alex. “Why do you speak in that exaggerated sort of way? If she had been killed there would have been a coroner’s inquest and a trial, and the murderer would have been discovered and—and hanged. Why do you talk such rot?”
“Oh, there are many ways of killing a person, and mother died for want of sunshine.”
“Oh, I see. Well, well! good-night.”
He kissed me again and left the room.
During the next day or two I was very busy. Father had said that the house was to be put in order. Now, what that meant I could not tell, but the house on the whole was about in as much order as such a great, desolate, and unfurnished abode could be. But when the next day at breakfast I found a second letter from father on my plate, and when I opened it and read father’s own directions that the spare room was to be got ready for the reception of himself and his wife on the following Sunday, I knew that Hannah and I must come either to open war or to a dismissal of the latter. I went down to the kitchen and told her at once.
“The spare room, forsooth!” she said. “Well, yes, I thought of that last night. Master said it was to be put in order, but he needn’t have written; I’d have seen to it.”
I was greatly relieved at this change of front. Hannah was looking quite gentle. She was moving about in the kitchen in quite an orderly fashion. The little cooking-stove was black instead of grey; there were no ashes to be seen anywhere, and a bright little fire burned in it. There was a pot on, and there was something boiling in the pot, and the thing that boiled and bubbled gave forth a most appetising smell. When I spoke Hannah turned and opened the oven door, and I saw inside a great cake.
“Why, Hannah!” I said.
“It’s only right to have cake and that sort of thing handy,” she said. “Don’t talk nonsense, Dumps. There’s a deal for you and me to do. Be you going to school to-day?”
“No,” I said.