The Red-haired Girl
A Wife’s Story
––––––––
In 1876 we took a house in one of the best streets and parts of B——. I do not give the name of the street or the number of the house, because the circumstances that occurred in that place were such as to make people nervous, and shy—unreasonably so—of taking those lodgings, after reading our experiences therein.
We were a small family—my husband, a grown-up daughter, and myself; and we had two maids—a cook, and the other was house- and parlourmaid in one. We had not been a fortnight in the house before my daughter said to me one morning: “Mamma, I do not like Jane”—that was our house-parlourmaid.
“Why so?” I asked. “She seems respectable, and she does her work systematically. I have no fault to find with her, none whatever.”
“She may do her
