‘P’leaceman, I’m as hinicent about that air gal as a new-born babe.’

‘Mrs. Gudgeon,’ I said, ’I only want you to tell a friend of mine about your daughter.’

‘Oh yis! a friend o’ yourn!  Another or two on ye in plain clothes behind the door, I dessay.  An’ pray who said the gal wur my darter?  What for do you want to put words into the mouth of a hinicent dyin’ woman?  I comed by ’er ’onest enough.  The pore half-starved thing came up to me in Llanbeblig churchyard.’

‘Llanbeblig churchyard?’ I exclaimed, drawing close up to the bed.  ‘How came you in Llanbeblig churchyard?’ But then I remembered that, according to her own story, she had married a Welshman.

‘How did I come in Llanbeblig churchyard?’ said the woman in a tone in which irony and fear were strangely mingled.  ’Well, p’leaceman, I don’t mean to be sarcy:  but seein’ as all my pore dear ’usband’s kith and kin o’ the name o’ Goodjohn was buried in Llanbeblig churchyard, p’raps you’ll be kind enough to let me go there sometimes, an’ p’raps be buried there when my time comes.’

‘But what took you there?’ I said.

‘What took me to Llanbeblig churchyard?’ exclaimed the woman, whose natural dogged courage seemed to be returning to her.  ’What made me leave every fardin’ I had in the world with Poll Onion, when we ommust wanted bread, an’ go to Carnarvon on Shanks’s pony?  I sha’n’t tell ye.  I comed by the gal ‘onest enough, an’ she never comed to no ‘arm through me, less mendin’ ’er does for ‘er, and bringin’ ’er to London, and bein’ a mother to ‘er, an’ givin’ ‘er a few baskets an’ matches to sell is a-doin’ ’er any ‘arm.  An’ as to beggin’ she would beg, she loved to beg an’ say texes.’

‘Old kidnapper!’ I cried, maddened by the visions that came upon me.  ‘How do I know that she came to no harm with a wretch like you?’

The woman shrank back upon the pillows in a revival of her terror.  ’She never comed to no ’arm, p’leaceman.  No, no, she never comed to no ‘arm through me.  I’d a darter once o’ my own, Jenny Gudgeon by name—­p’raps you know’d ‘er, most o’ the coppers did—­as was brought up by my sister by marriage at Carnarvon, an’ I sent for ’er to London, I did, pl’eaceman—­God forgi’e me—­an’ she went wrong all through me bein’ a drinkin’ woman an’ not seein’ arter ’er, just as my son Bob tookt to drink, through me bein’ a drinkin’ woman an’ not seein’ arter him.  She tookt and went from bad to wuss, bad to wuss; it’s my belief as it’s allus starvation as drives ’em to it; an’ when she wur a-dyin’ gal, she sez to me, “Mother,” sez she, “I’ve got the smell o’ Welsh vi’lets on me ag’in:  I wants to be buried in Llanbeblig churchyard, among the Welsh child’n an’ maids, mother.  I wants to feel the snowdrops, an’ smell the vi’lets, an’ the primroses, a-growin’ over my ’ead,” sez she; “but that can’t never be, mother,” sez she, a-sobbin’ fit to bust; “never, never, for such as me,” sez she.  An’ I know’d what she meant, though she never once blamed me, an’ ’er words stuck in my gizzard like a thorn, p’leaceman.’