“When I first came,” I said to her, “I told you I wanted to help. That’s what I’m here for. But how am I to help either you or the children when I do not know what danger it is that threatens? It isn’t fair to you, or to them, or even to me.”

She was much shaken by the poison incident. I thought she wavered.

“Are you afraid the children will be stolen?”

“Oh, no.”

“Or hurt in any way?” I was thinking of the bread on the roof.

“No.”

“But you are afraid of something?”

Harry looked up suddenly.

“Mother’s never afraid,” he said stoutly.

I sent them both in to see if the fish were still dead.