At any rate, she changed colour, and left the room.

What on earth does it mean ?" I could not bring myself to tell him the girl's story, even then.

It would have been almost as good as telling him that she was the thief.
Besides, even if I had made a clean breast of it, and even supposing she was the thief, the reason why she should let out her secret to Mr.
Franklin, of all the people in the world, would have been still as far to seek as ever.
"I can't bear the idea of getting the poor girl into a scrape, merely because she has a flighty way with her, and talks very strangely," Mr.
Franklin went on.

"And yet if she had said to, the Superintendent what she said to me, fool as he is, I'm afraid----" He stopped there, and left the rest unspoken.
"The best way, sir," I said, "will be for me to say two words privately to my mistress about it at the first opportunity.

My lady has a very friendly interest in Rosanna; and the girl may only have been forward and foolish, after all.