“Ah!⁠—she understands what she has to do⁠—nobody better,” rejoined Leah significantly; “and it is not everyone could fill her shoes⁠—not for all the money she gets.”

“That it is not!” was the reply. “I wonder whether the master⁠—”

The charwoman was going on; but here Leah turned and perceived me, and she instantly gave her companion a nudge.

“Doesn’t she know?” I heard the woman whisper.

Leah shook her head, and the conversation was of course dropped. All I had gathered from it amounted to this⁠—that there was a mystery at Thornfield; and that from participation in that mystery I was purposely excluded.