"We have met with a great loss. You have heard of—in fact, I know you have seen—the Middleton bowl."
"I should think so! My dear Miss Middleton, you don't mean to say that anything has happened to that? Oh, how shocking! Is it broken, or has it been stolen?"
"It is broken. It would almost have been better had it been stolen. Do you not agree with me, Joanna?"
"I do," said Miss Joanna. Miss Thomasine did not speak.
"For there is a great mystery connected with it," continued the speaker. "We cannot discover who broke it."
"Could it have been one of the servants?" asked Mrs. Hoyt, eagerly. "Oh, that beautiful bowl! so valuable! so exquisite! It must have been one of the servants."
"It was not," snapped Miss Joanna. "They have lived with us from fifteen to thirty years, and they were all in another part of the house when it happened. It was some one else."
"We thought at first that it must have been our niece, Theodora," continued Miss Middleton. "There were certain circumstances which led us to suspect her very strongly; but she declares that she did not do it, and our sister Thomasine is inclined to believe her."
"I am quite sure that Theodora did not break the bowl," said Miss Thomasine, quietly but firmly.