With the pleasurable instinct of service, he hastened after them.
They heard him, and turning waited his approach. He took off his
hat, and presenting the book to the young woman, asked if she had
dropped it. Possibly, had they been ordinary people of the class to
which they seemed to belong, he would not have uncovered to them,
for he naturally shrunk from what might be looked upon as a display
of courtesy, but their deformity rendered it imperative. Her face
flushed so at sight of the book, that, in order to spare her
uneasiness, Wingfold could not help saying with a smile,

"Do not be alarmed: I have not read one word of it."

She returned his smile with much sweetness, and said--

"I see I need not have been afraid."

Her companion joined in thanks and apologies for having caused him
so much trouble. Wingfold assured them it had been but a pleasure.
It was far from a scrutinizing look with which he regarded them, but
the interview left him with the feeling that their faces were
refined and intelligent, and their speech was good. Again he lifted
his rather shabby hat, the man responded with equal politeness in
removing from a great grey head one rather better, and they turned
from each other and went their ways, the sight of their malformation
arousing in the curate no such questions as those with which it had
agitated the tongue, if not the heart, of George Bascombe, to widen
the scope of his perplexities. He had heard the loud breathing of
the man, and seen the projecting eyes of the woman, but he never
said to himself therefore that they were more hardly dealt with than
he. Had such a thought occurred to him, he would have comforted the