"Your husband, madam!" Matthew protested, shocked.

"I wouldn't say that I recognized him as he _was_," said the real Mrs.
Henry Leek. "No more than he recognizes me. After thirty years!....Last
time I saw him he was only twenty-two or twenty-three. But he's the same
sort of man, and he has the same eyes. And look at Henry's eyes.
Besides, I heard twenty-five years ago that he'd gone into service with
a Mr. Priam Farll, a painter or something, him that was buried in
Westminster Abbey. And everybody in Putney knows that this gentleman----"

"Gentleman!" murmured Matthew, discontented.

"Was valet to Mr. Priam Farll. We've heard that everywhere."

"I suppose you'll not deny," said Henry the younger, "that Priam Farll
wouldn't be likely to have _two_ valets named Henry Leek?"

Crushed by this Socratic reasoning, Priam kept silence, nursing his
knees and staring into the fire.

Alice went to the sideboard where she kept her best china, and took out
three extra cups and saucers.

"I think we'd all better have some tea," she said tranquilly. And then
she got the tea-caddy and put seven teaspoonfuls of tea into one of the
tea-pots.

"It's very kind of you, I'm sure," whimpered the authentic Mrs. Henry
Leek.