Mrs Devitt raised her eyebrows.

"I mean nothin'," corrected Devitt.

"How very distressing!" remarked Victoria in her exquisitely
modulated voice. "We should try and do something for her."

"We will," said her father.

"We certainly owe a duty to those who were once our neighbours,"
assented Miss Spraggs.

"Do you remember her?" asked Mrs Devitt of her husband.

"Of course I do, now I come to think of it," he replied.

"What was she like?"

He paused for a moment or two before replying.

"She'd reddy sort of hair and queer eyes. She was a fine little
girl, but a fearful tomboy," said Devitt.

"Pretty, then!" exclaimed Mrs Devitt, as she glanced apprehensively
at her step-daughter.

"She was then. It was her hair that did it," answered her husband.

"H'm!" came from his wife.