"I wonder why she did that?" said Mrs. Bunce.
"Oh! most likely to avoid exciting any suspicion or curiosity at the office in Southampton Row. Then there's another thing that puzzles me:—she was with Tom Rain last night—Jacob saw them together, and followed them home to Lock's Fields; and she is away from him to-day—writes to him this afternoon—and hopes to find a letter from him when she goes to Southampton Row this evening. One would think, by this, that they have been in the habit of corresponding together, and that the place in Southampton Row is where he directs his letters to her. So it's pretty clear that they don't live together for good and all. But what perplexes me most is the sermon that she wrote him. It's plain she stole the diamonds, from what Jacob overheard Tom say to her when he gave her the ear-rings last night; and yet she doesn't reproach herself a bit in the letter to him. She only tries to convert Rainford; and, to read that letter, one would think she was as innocent of a theft or such-like thing as a child unborn."
"Oh! I dare say she wrote the letter for some object or another which we can't see," observed Mrs. Bunce.
"I scarcely think so," returned Bones: "there was so much seriousness about it."
"But she's a precious deep one, depend on it," said Betsy. "Look how she got off about the diamonds. And, after all, perhaps her father had been talking her over; and so, if she wrote to Tom Rain in a serious way, the humour won't last very long."
"Well—we shall see," exclaimed Old Death. "I should like to secure her in my interests."
"What did you do with the letter she wrote to Tom Rain?" asked Mrs. Bunce.
"Put it back into the post," was the reply. "Fancy if Esther and Tom _did_ get together again, and, on comparing notes, he found that the letter from her had miscarried, he might suspect a trick somewhere, and fix foul play on me. No—no: it was more prudent to let the note go, since I had gathered its contents."
"Well—perhaps it was," said Mrs. Bunce. "One thing is very clear, Ben——"
"Why—that since Esther isn't any longer with Mr. Rainford in the Fields, it will be much easier to get the little boy away."
"I thought of that just now," said Old Death: then, after a pause, he added, "And I'll tell you what's to be done. The boy most be got into our power to-morrow night."