'Yes; it is one I gave him.'
'You—gave him? An extraordinary present.'
'Not at all. I was his sister; and I know that an old bachelor's wardrobe would be in a sad state of neglect. I intended to replenish him with linen altogether.'
Philip was greatly surprised. He looked fixedly at his aunt, to make out whether she were speaking seriously. She dashed off, however, at once on another topic.
'That girl,' she said, 'naturally resisted the conclusions at which I have arrived.'
'Why naturally?'
'Oh, you greenhorn! Because if it be established that Jeremiah is dead, out goes the whole Cusworth brood. They have lived here and preyed on him so long that they cannot endure the notion of having to leave, and will fight tooth and nail against the establishment of his decease.'
'Not at all. You misjudge them. They allow that he is dead, but disbelieve in the identity of the corpse found with my uncle who is lost, which is another matter.'
'Out they shall go,' said Mrs. Sidebottom.
'It is painful for them to leave a house where they have been happy, and in which the young ladies have grown up from childhood.'