"Have you filled the station of housekeeper before?"

"Only once. I have lived with the same widow lady for twelve years. Ever
since I lost my husband. She was an invalid, and is lately dead: which
is the occasion of my now wearing black."

"I do not doubt that she has left you the best credentials?" said Mr.
Wilding.

"I hope I may say, the very best. I thought it would save trouble, sir,
if I wrote down the name and address of her representatives, and brought
it with me." Laying a card on the table.

"You singularly remind me, Mrs. Goldstraw," said Wilding, taking the card
beside him, "of a manner and tone of voice that I was once acquainted
with. Not of an individual--I feel sure of that, though I cannot recall
what it is I have in my mind--but of a general bearing. I ought to add,
it was a kind and pleasant one."

She smiled, as she rejoined: "At least, I am very glad of that, sir."

"Yes," said the wine-merchant, thoughtfully repeating his last phrase,
with a momentary glance at his future housekeeper, "it was a kind and
pleasant one. But that is the most I can make of it. Memory is
sometimes like a half-forgotten dream. I don't know how it may appear to
you, Mrs. Goldstraw, but so it appears to me."

Probably it appeared to Mrs. Goldstraw in a similar light, for she
quietly assented to the proposition. Mr. Wilding then offered to put
himself at once in communication with the gentlemen named upon the card: