appeared.

"You don't suppose they'll send them to prison?" she said.

"They'll both be acquitted," said Horace. "Don't worry, Mrs. Whitman."

"I've got to worry. How can I help worrying? Even if poor Lucinda is
acquitted, lots of folks will always believe it, and her boarders
will drop away, and as for Hannah Simmons, I shouldn't be a mite
surprised if it broke her match off."

"It's a dreadful thing," said Henry; "but don't you fret too much
over it, Sylvia. Maybe she killed herself, and if they think that
Lucinda won't have any trouble afterwards."

"I think some have that opinion now," said Horace.

Sylvia sniffed. "A woman don't kill herself as long as she's got
spirit enough to fix herself up," she said. "I saw her only yesterday
in a brand-new dress, and her hair was crimped tight enough to last a
week, and her cheeks--"

"Come, Sylvia," said Henry, admonishingly.

"You needn't be afraid. I ain't going to talk about them that's dead
and gone, and especially when they've gone in such a dreadful way;
and maybe it wasn't true," said Sylvia. "But it's just as I say: when
a woman is fixed up the way Miss Eliza Farrel was yesterday, she
ain't within a week of making way with herself. Seems as if I might
have had forethought enough to have got that kitten for poor Lucinda."