"Do you remember me?" she asked, throwing back her veil so as to give an unobstructed view of her full, florid face.

 

"Are you the girl who brought the boy Jed to me fourteen years ago?"

 

"The same. I don't find you in your old place."

 

"No; we—my husband and I—left the poor farm about a year since. Have you been there?"

 

"Yes, I saw the new woman, and a spiteful piece she is, I'll be bound."

 

Mrs. Avery smiled.

 

"I don't admire Mrs. Fogson," she said, "but I suppose that is natural."

 

"She tells me the boy is no longer in the poorhouse."

 

[Pg 329]

 

"No."

 

"Can you tell me why he left?"

 

"He was ill-treated by Mr. and Mrs. Fogson."

 

"That woman tells me he was very troublesome."

 

"We never found him so, and up to a year ago he was under our charge."

 

"I surmised¹ as much. Then he has grown up a good boy?"

 

"Excellent. I feel great affection for Jed."

 

"That is gratifying to my feelings, seeing I am his aunt."

 

Mrs. Avery regarded her visitor with surprise.

 

"Do you claim Jed as your nephew?" she asked.

 

"Certainly. He is the son of my only brother."

 

But for her interview with the detective Mrs. Avery would have believed this story. As it was, she did not choose to dispute it. She only sought to draw out her visitor so as to understand better her object in calling.

 

"Are you willing to explain why it was[Pg 330] that you were led to place your nephew under my care?"

 

"Certainly. There is no secret about that now. My brother, who was a blacksmith, failed, and was unable to support the boy."

 

"What was your brother's name?"

 

"Jedediah Gilman. That is why I desired to have the boy called Jed Gilman, after his father. My name is Jane Gilman."

 

"Then you are not married?"

 

"No," said Miss Gilman. "Not but I might have been married half a dozen times if I had wanted to. But the men are a shiftless lot, in my opinion."

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