He called up Martha Sarah.
'How did these things come in my room ?' he said, flinging the objectionable articles to the floor.
Martha said that Mrs.Newberry had given them to her to brush, and that she had brought them up there thinking they must be Mr.Stockdale's, as there was no other gentleman a-lodging there.
'Of course you did,' said Stockdale.

'Now take them down to your mis'ess, and say they are some clothes I have found here and know nothing about.' As the door was left open he heard the conversation downstairs.

'How stupid!' said Mrs.Newberry, in a tone of confusion.

'Why, Marther Sarer, I did not tell you to take 'em to Mr.Stockdale's room ?' 'I thought they must be his as they was so muddy,' said Martha humbly.
'You should have left 'em on the clothes-horse,' said the young mistress severely; and she came upstairs with the garments on her arm, quickly passed Stockdale's room, and threw them forcibly into a closet at the end of a passage.

With this the incident ended, and the house was silent again.
There would have been nothing remarkable in finding such clothes in a widow's house had they been clean; or moth-eaten, or creased, or mouldy from long lying by; but that they should be splashed with recent mud bothered Stockdale a good deal.