"Oh, you're the young lady he kept company with," she said. "Isn't it too bad? I don't believe he ever did it. No man in his senses would set his own house afire and then walk out in broad daylight, as I saw Mr. Floyd do."
"You saw Mr. Floyd coming out, then? Pardon my curiosity, but I am so deeply interested——"
"I shouldn't think much of you if you were not," said Senda Wesner. "I'm glad to tell all I know about it, and I can't see for the life of me why they didn't call me to the stand."
Emily saw that no apology was needed for questioning the bake-shop girl. She was easy to make free with and fond of running on. Being a little reticent herself, Emily was glad to be relieved of the necessity of putting inquiries. So she simply guided the little gossip's talk.
"You did see Mr. Floyd leave the house? Was it long before the fire broke out?"
"Four or five minutes. I'd noticed Bertha raising the curtains—two Washington pies? yes'm—I'd seen Bertha up in the study, I say, but then Joe Tyke, Joey, we call him, the cripple newsboy, though he is quite a man now, but he never grew, deformed, you know—Joey was trundling himself along on his little cart, and I couldn't take my eyes off of him—20 cents, yes'm." The bake-shop girl continued to spread jam, ladle milk and wrap warm loaves in fresh brown paper, all the while, but her interruptions only formed tiny ripples on her flowing stream of prattle. "Then Mr. Robert came out and walked down to the corner slowly. But do you know what puzzled me? What was he stooping over the hearth for and picking up those pieces of paper?"
"People often do that. Perhaps he had torn up a letter and some of it had scattered outside the fireplace."
"Well, I didn't see another thing, not one thing, against him," said Miss Wesner, decidedly. Her ideas on the value of evidence were certainly of the most feminine order. "I'm sure he's a young man of the highest reputation. Never smoked or drank or——"
"You didn't see any other person coming out of the house?"
"No, I didn't. Yes, Gertrude, and how's your mamma? That's a sweet thing, only 10 years old, but does all the errands and half the housework for her mother, that's sick, and never slaps the baby."