‘The wedding isn’t till next year,’ said Vera, in recounting the story to her best girl friend, ‘and meanwhile old Betsy is living rent free, with soup twice a week and my aunt’s doctor to see her whenever she has a finger ache.’

‘But how on earth did you get to know about it all?’ asked her friend, in admiring wonder.

‘It was a mystery—’ said Vera.

‘Of course it was a mystery, a mystery that baffled everybody. What beats me is how you found out—’

‘Oh, about the jewels? I invented that part,’ explained Vera; ‘I mean the mystery was where old Betsy’s arrears of rent were to come from; and she would have hated leaving that jolly quince tree.’