precious in God's sight Lydia would part with for that possession
which Satan prizes--money.

Cecile, when she first came to Warren's Grove, had put her treasure
into so secure and out-of-the-way a hiding place that she felt quite
easy about it. Lydia would never, never think of troubling her head
about that attic sloping down to the roof, still less would she poke
her fingers into the little secret cupboard where the precious purse
lay.

Cecile's mind therefore was quite light. But one morning, about a
week after Mrs. Bell's funeral, as she and Maurice were preparing to
start out for their usual ramble, these words smote on her ears with
a strange and terrible sense of dread.

"Jane," said Lydia, addressing the cook, "we must all do with a cold
dinner to-day, and not too much of that, for, as you write a very
neat hand, I want you to help me with the inventory, and it has got
to be begun at once. I told Mr. Preston I would have no agent
pottering about the place. 'Tis a long job, but I will do it myself."

"What's an inkin-dory?" asked Maurice, raising a curious little face
to Jane.

"Bless yer heart, honey," said Jane, stooping down and kissing him,
"an inventory you means. Why, 'tis just this--Mrs. Purcell and me--we
has got to write down the names of every single thing in the house
--every stick, and stone, and old box, and even, I believe, the names
of the doors and cupboards. That's an inventory, and mighty sick
we'll be of it."