Which suggestion was distinctly unkind, seeing the man in corduroy trousers was Martha’s most ardent and favoured admirer.

The next day the washing basin in Meg’s room went, and after that a chair from the nursery, and a strip of carpet from the top landing, not to mention such small things as a teapot, a spirit-lamp, cups and plates, half a horn, and a whole baking of gingerbread nuts.

The losses preyed upon Martha, for the things seemed to disappear while the children were in bed; and though she suspected them, and watched them continually, she could get no clear proof of their guilt, nor even find any motive for them abstracting such things.

And after the disappearance of each fresh article, Pip used to ask whether the corduroy-trousered gentleman had been to the house the night before.  And as it always happened, that he had, Martha could do nothing but cast a wrathful glance at the boy and flounce from the room.

One night the little chess-table from the nursery was spirited away.

Pip fell upon Martha’s neck the, next morning early, as she was sweeping the carpet, and affected to be dissolved in tears.

“‘We never prize the violet,’” he said, in broken tones.  “Ah!  Martha, Martha! we never felt what a treasure we had in you till now, when your days with us are numbered.”

“Get along with you,” she said, hitting out at him with the broom handle.  “And I ain’t a-goin’ to leave, so don’t you think it.  You’d have it your own way then too much.  No; you don’t get shut of Martha Tornlinson just yet, young man.”

“But won’t he be wanting you, Martha?” he said gently.  “His furnishing must be nearly finished now.  He’s not taken a saucepan yet, nor a flat-iron, I know; but there’s everything else, Martha; and I don’t mind telling you in confidence I’m thinking of giving you a flat-iron myself as a wedding present, so you needn’t wait till he comes for that.”

“Get out with you!” said Martha again, thrusting the broom-head right into his face, and nearly choking him with dust.  “It’s a limb of the old gentleman himself you are.”

Away in the loft things were getting very comfortable.

A couple of rugs hung on the walls kept out the draught.  Judy’s bed, soft and warm, was in a corner; she had a chair to sit in, a table to eat at, even a basin in which to perform her ablutions.  And she had company all day; and nearly always all night.  Once Meg had stolen away, after fastening her bedroom door, and had shared the bed in the loft; once Nellie had gone, and the other night Pip had taken a couple of blankets and made himself a shakedown among the straw.  They used to pay her visits at all hours of the day, creeping up the creaking ladder one after the other, whenever they could get away unnoticed.

The governess had, as it happened, a fortnight’s holiday, to nurse a sick mother, so the girls and Bunty had no demands on their time.  Pip used to go to school late and come back early, cajoling notes of excuse, whenever, possible, out of Esther.  He even played the truant once, and took a caning for it afterwards quite good-humouredly.