August was hot in Honey Fair. The women sat at their open doors, or even outside them; the children tumbled in the gutters; the refuse in the road was none the better for the month's heat.

Charlotte East sat in her kitchen one Tuesday afternoon, busy as usual. Her door was shut, but her window was open. Suddenly the latch was lifted and Mrs. Cross came in: not with the bold, boisterous movements that were common to Honey Fair, but with creeping steps that seemed afraid of their own echoes, and a scared face.

Mrs. Cross was in trouble. Her two daughters, Amelia and Mary Ann, to whom you have had the honour of an introduction, had purchased those lovely cross-barred sarcenets, green, pink, and lilac, and worn them at the party at the Alhambra: which party went off satisfactorily, leaving nothing behind it but some headaches for the next day, and a trifle of pecuniary embarrassment to Honey Fair in general. What with the finery for the party, and other finery, and what with articles really useful, but which perhaps might have been done without, Honey Fair was pretty deeply in with the Messrs. Bankes. In Mrs. Cross's family alone, herself and her daughters owed, conjointly, so much to these accommodating tradesmen that it took eight shillings a week to keep them quiet. You can readily understand how this impoverished the weekly housekeeping; and the falsehoods that had to be concocted, by way of keeping the husband, Jacob Cross, in the dark, were something alarming. This was the state of things in many of the homes of Honey Fair.

Mrs. Cross came in with timid steps and a scared face. "Charlotte, lend me five shillings for the love of goodness!" cried she, speaking as if afraid of the sound of her own voice. "I don't know another soul to ask but you. There ain't another that would have it to lend, barring Dame Buffle, and she never lends."

"You owe me twelve shillings already," answered Charlotte, pausing for a moment in her sewing.

"I know that. I'll pay you off by degrees, if it's only a shilling a week. I am a'most drove mad. Bankes's folks was here yesterday, and me and the girls had only four shillings to give 'em. I'm getting in arrears frightful, and Bankes's is as cranky over it as can be. It's all smooth and fair so long as you're buying of Bankes's and paying 'em; but just get behind, and see what short answers and sour looks you'll have!"

"But Amelia and Mary Ann took in their work on Saturday and had their money?"

"My patience! I don't know what us should do if they hadn't! We have to pay up everywhere. We're in debt at Buffle's, in debt to the baker, in debt for shoes; we're in debt on all sides. And there's Cross spending three shilling good of his wages at the public-house! It takes what me and the girls earn to pay a bit up here and there, and stop things from coming to Cross's ears. Half the house is in the pawn-shop, and what'll become of us I don't know. I can't sleep o' nights, hardly, for thinking on't."

Charlotte felt sure that, were it her case, she should not sleep at all.

"The worst is, I have to keep the little 'uns away from school. Pay for 'em I can't. And a fine muck they get into, playing in the road all day. 'What does these children do to theirselves at school, to get into this dirty mess?' asks Cross, when he comes in. 'Oh, they plays a bit in the gutter coming home,' says I. 'We plays a bit, father,' cries they, when they hears me, a-winking at each other to think how we does their father."

Charlotte shook her head. "I should end it all."

"End it! I wish we could end it! The girls is going to slave theirselves night and day this week and next. But it's not for my good: it's for their'n. They want to get their grand silks out o' pawn! Nothing but outside finery goes down with them, though they've not an inside rag to their backs. They leave care to me. Fools to be sure, they was, to buy them silks! They have been in the pawn-shop ever since, and Bankes's a-tearing 'em to pieces for the money!"

"I should end it by confessing to Jacob," said Charlotte, when she could get in a word. "He is not a bad husband——"

"And look at his passionate temper!" broke in Mrs. Cross. "Let it get to his ears that we have gone on tick to Bankes's and elsewhere, and he'd rave the house out of winders."

"He would be angry at first, no doubt; but when he cooled down he would see the necessity of something being done, and help in it. If you all set on and put your shoulders to the wheel you might soon get clear. Live upon the very least that will satisfy hunger—the plainest food—dry bread and potatoes. No beer, no meat, no finery, no luxuries; and with the rest of the week's money begin to pay up. You'd be clear in no time."

Mrs. Cross stared in consternation. "You be a Job's comforter, Charlotte! Dry bread and taters! who could put up with that?"

"When poor people like us fall into trouble, it is the only way that I know of to get out of it. I'd rather mortify my appetite for a year than have my rest broken by care."

"Your advice is good enough for talking, Charlotte, but it don't answer for acting. Cross must have his bit o' meat and his beer, his butter and his cheese, his tea and his sugar—and so must the rest on us. But about this five shillings?—do lend it me, Charlotte! It is for the landlord: we're almost in a fix with him."

"For the landlord!" repeated Charlotte involuntarily. "You must keep him paid, or it would be the worst of all."

"I know we must. He was took bad yesterday—more's the blessing!—and couldn't get round; but he's here to-day as burly as beef. We haven't paid him for this three weeks," she added, dropping her voice to an ominous whisper; "and I declare to you, Charlotte East, that the sight of him at our door is as good to me as a dose of physic. Just now, round he comes, a-lifting the latch, and me turning sick the minute I sees him. 'Ready, Mrs. Cross?' asks he, in his short, surly way, putting his brown wig up. 'I'm sorry I ain't, Mr. Abbott, sir,' says I; 'but I'll have some next week for certain.' 'That won't do for me,' says he: 'I must have it this. If you can't give me some money, I shall apply to your husband.' The fright this put me into I've not got over yet, Charlotte; for Cross don't know but what the rent's paid up regular. 'I know what's going on,' old Abbott begins again, 'and I have knowed it for some time. You women in this Honey Fair, you pay your money to them Bankeses, which is the blight o' the place, and then you can't pay me.' Only fancy his calling Bankeses a blight!"

"That's just what they are," remarked Charlotte.

"For shame, Charlotte East! When one's way is a bit eased by being able to get a few things on trust, you must put in your word again it! Some of us would never get a new gown to our backs if it wasn't for Bankeses. Abbott's gone off to other houses, collecting; warning me as he'd call again in half an hour, and if some money wasn't ready for him then he'd go straight off to Jacob, to his shop o' work. If you can let me have one week for him, Charlotte—five shillings—I'll be ever grateful."

Charlotte rose, unlocked a drawer, and gave five shillings to Mrs. Cross, thinking in her own mind that the kindest course would be for the landlord to go to Cross, as he had threatened.

Mrs. Cross took the money. Her mind so far relieved, she could indulge in a little gossip; for Mr. Abbott's half-hour had not yet expired.

"I say, Charlotte, what d'ye think? I'm afraid Ben Tyrrett and our Mary Ann is a-going to take up together."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Charlotte. "That's new."

"Not over-new. They have been talking together on and off, but I never thought it was serious till last Sunday. I have set my face dead against it. He has a nasty temper of his own; and he's nothing but a jobber at fifteen shillings a week, and his profits of the egg-whites. Our Mary Ann might do better than that."

"I think she might," assented Charlotte. "And she is over-young to think of marrying."

"Young!" wrathfully repeated Mrs. Cross. "I should think she is young! Girls are as soft as apes. The minute a chap says a word to 'em about marrying, they're all agog to do it, whether it's fit, or whether it's unfit. Our Mary Ann might look inches over Ben Tyrrett's head, if she had any sense in her. Hark ye, Charlotte! When you see her, just put in a word against it; maybe it'll turn her. Tell her you'd not have Tyrrett at a gift."

"And that's true," replied Charlotte, with a laugh, as her guest departed.

A few minutes, and Charlotte received another visitor. This was the wife of Mark Mason—a tall, bony woman, with rough black hair and a loud voice. That voice and Mark did not get on very well together. She put her hands back upon her hips, and used it now, standing before Charlotte in a threatening attitude.

"What do you do, keeping our Carry out at night?"

Charlotte looked up in surprise. She was thinking of something else, or her answer might have been more cautious, for she was one of those who never willingly make mischief.

"I do not keep Caroline out. She is here of an evening now and then—not often."

Mrs. Mason laughed—a low derisive laugh of mockery. "I knew it was a falsehood when she told it me! There she goes out, night after night, night after night; so I set Mark on to her, for I couldn't keep her in, neither find out where she went to. Mark was in a passion—something had put him out, and Carry was frightened, for he had hold of her arm savage-like. 'I am at Charlotte East's of a night, Mark,' she said. 'I shall take no harm there.'"

Charlotte did not lift her eyes from her work. Mrs. Mason stood defiantly.

"Now, then! Where is it she gets to?"

"Why do you apply to me?" returned Charlotte. "I am not Caroline Mason's keeper."

"If you bain't her keeper, you be her adviser," retorted Mrs. Mason. "And that's worse."

"When I advise Caroline at all, I advise her for her good."

"My eyes are opened now, if they was blind before," continued Mrs. Mason, apostrophizing in no gentle terms the offending Caroline. "Who gave Carry that there shawl?—who gave, her that there fine gown?—who gave her that gold brooch, with a stone in it 'twixt red and yaller, and a naked Cupid in white aflying on it? 'A nice brooch you've got there, miss,' says I to her. 'Yes,' says she, 'they call 'em cameons.' 'And where did you get it, pray?' says I. 'And that's my business,' answers she. Next there was a neck-scarf, green and lavender, with yaller fringe at its ends, as deep as my forefinger. 'You're running up a tidy score at Bankes's, my lady,' says I. 'I shan't come to you to pay for it,' says she. 'No,' thinks I to myself, 'but you be living in our house, and you may bring Mark into trouble over it,' for he's a soft-hearted gander at times. So down I goes to Bankes's place last night. 'Just turn to the debt-book, young man,' says I to the gentleman behind the counter—it were the one with the dark hair—'and tell me how much is owed by Caroline Mason.' 'Come to settle it?' asks he. 'Maybe, and maybe not,' says I. 'I wants my question answered, whether or no.' Are you listening, Charlotte East?"

Charlotte lifted her eyes from her work. "Yes."

"He lays hold of a big book," continues Mrs. Mason, who was talking her face crimson, "and draws his finger down its pages. 'Caroline Mason—Caroline Mason,' says he. 'I don't think we have anything against her. No: it's crossed off. There was a trifle against her, but she paid it last week.' Well, I stood staring at the man, thinking he was deceiving me, saying she had paid. 'When did she pay for that shawl she had in the winter, and how much did it cost?' asks I. 'Shawl?' says he. 'Caroline Mason hasn't had no shawl of us.' 'Nor a gown at Easter—a fancy sort of thing, with stripes?' I goes on: 'nor a cameon brooch last week? nor a scarf with yaller fringe?' 'Nothing o' the sort,' says he, decisive. 'Caroline Mason hasn't bought any of those things from us. She had some bonnet ribbon, and that she paid for.' Now, what was I to think?" concluded Mrs. Mason.

Charlotte did not know.

"I comes home a-pondering, and at the corner of the lane I catches sight of a certain gentleman loitering about in the shade. The truth flashed into my mind. 'He's after our Caroline,' says I to myself; 'and it's him that has given her the things, and we shall just have her a world's spectacle!' I accused Eliza Tyrrett of being the confidant. 'It isn't me,' says she; 'it's Charlotte East.' So I bottled up my temper till now, and now I've come to learn the rights on't."

"I cannot tell you the rights," replied Charlotte. "I do not know them. I have striven to give Caroline some good advice lately, and that is all I have had to do with it. Mrs. Mason, you know that I should never advise Caroline, or any one else, but for her good."

Mrs. Mason would have acknowledged this in a cooler moment. "Why did that Tyrrett girl laugh at me, then? And why did Carry say she spent her evenings here?" cried she. "The gentleman I see was young Anthony Dare: and Carry had better bury herself alive than be drawn aside by his nonsense."

"Much better," acquiesced Charlotte. "Where is Caroline?"

"Under lock and key," said Mrs. Mason.

"Under lock and key!" echoed Charlotte.

"Yes; under lock and key; and there she shall stop. She was out all this blessed morning with Eliza Tyrrett, and never walked herself in till after Mark had had his dinner and was gone. So then I began upon her. My temper was up, and I didn't spare her. I vowed I'd tell Mark what I had seen and heard, and what sort of a wolf she allowed to make her presents of fine clothes. With that she turned wild and flung up to her room in the cock-loft, and I followed and locked her in."

"You have done very wrong," said Charlotte. "It is not by harshness that any good will be done with Caroline. You know her disposition: a child might lead her by kindness, but she rises up against harshness. My opinion is that she never would have given the least trouble at all had you made her a better home."

This bold avowal took away Mrs. Mason's breath. "A better home!" cried she, when she could speak. "A better home! Fed upon French rolls and lobster salad and apricot tarts, and give her a lady's maid to hook-and-eye her gown for her! My heart! that beats all."

"I don't speak of food, and that sort of thing," rejoined Charlotte. "If you had treated her with kind words instead of cross ones she would have been as good a girl as ever lived. Instead of that you have made your home unbearable; and so driven her out, with her dangerous good looks, to be told of them by the first idler who came across her: and that seems to have been Anthony Dare. Go home and let her out of where you have locked her in; do, Hetty Mason! Let her out, and speak kindly to her, and treat her as a sister; and you'll undo all the bad yet."

"I shan't then!" was the passionate reply. "I'll see you and her hung first, before I speak kind to her to encourage her in her loose ways!"

Mrs. Mason flung out of the house as she concluded, giving the door a bang which only had the effect of sending it open again. Charlotte sighed as she rose to close it: not only for any peril that Caroline Mason might be in, but for the general blindness, the distorted views of right and wrong, which seemed to obtain amidst the women of Honey Fair.