"A situation! Where? Not at Alnwick?"
"Oh dear no; not at Alnwick; in a different county; not very far, I think, from her native place."
"Mamma, if ever you see her, ask her whether the boy's spirit comes and haunts her in the night? It may; for she murdered him. She ought to suffer on the scaffold for her work. I wish she could; I might be more at rest."
"Oh, Charlotte! Charlotte!" soothingly spoke Mrs. Darling from the depths of her fearful heart,--fearful she knew not of what.
"Come and look here!" interrupted Rose in a whisper.
They both turned. The little lad had fallen into a light doze on her lap, his wan hand clasping Rose's blue ribbons, and the upright line on his pale forehead seeming to denote that he had gone to sleep in pain.
"Charlotte," said Rose, earnestly, "I'm not used to children, and don't pretend to understand them as you must do; but my belief is, that this child wants rest--repose from travelling. It cannot be good for him to be hurried about incessantly. It is wearing him out."
"You do not understand them," returned Mrs. St. John. "It is for him that I move about. He grows so languid whenever we settle down. What should you know about children, Rose? Are you a nurse, or a doctor? You are not a mother. A chacun son métier."
"Comme vous voulez," returned Rose, with her pretty shrug. "Charlotte, I am going to visit where I shall see something of a sort of cousin of yours--Mr. St. John."
"Mr. St. John of Castle Wafer?" quickly asked Mrs. St. John, with more interest than she had yet displayed.