However, she went on talking of Mrs.Herne, as though to keep her mother from questioning her further.
"There is a mystery about Mrs.Herne," she said, coming to the fire; "for I asked Aunt Selina who she was, and she could not tell me." "That is so like Selina," rejoined Mrs.Octagon tartly, "receiving a person of whom she knows nothing." "Oh, she does know a little.

Mrs.Herne is the widow of a Spanish merchant, and she struck me as being foreign herself.

Aunt Selina has known her for three years, and she has come almost every week to play whist at Rose Cottage.

I believe she lives at Hampstead!" "It seems to me, Juliet, that your aunt told you a great deal about this person.

Why did you ask ?" Juliet stared into the fire.