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“What’s your business here?”

“Oh, tell me,” whimpered the woman, “what’s he doing all this time? Won’t his father see me? He don’t intend to leave me here all night, surely, in this bitter cold, with nothing to eat, and my gown ruined!”

“He?” ‘Lizabeth’s attitude stiffened with suspicion of the truth.

“William, I mean; an’ a sorry day it was I agreed to come.”

“William?”

“My husband. I’m Mrs. William Transom.”

“Come along to the house.” ‘Lizabeth turned abruptly and led the way.

Mrs. William Transom gathered up her carpet-bag and bedraggled skirts and followed, sobbing still, but in diminuendo. Inside the kitchen ‘Lizabeth faced round on her again.

“So you’m William’s wife.”

“I am; an’ small comfort to say so, seein’ this is how I’m served. Reely, now, I’m not fit to be seen.”

“Bless the woman, who cares here what you look like? Take off those fal-lals, an’ sit in your petticoat by the fire, here; you ain’t wet through–on’y your feet; and here’s a dry pair o’ stockings, if you’ve none i’ the bag. You must be possessed, to come trampin’ over High Compton in them gingerbread things.” She pointed scornfully at the stranger’s boots.

Mrs. William Transom, finding her notions of gentility thus ridiculed, acquiesced.

“An’ now,” resumed ‘Lizabeth, when her visitor was seated by the fire pulling off her damp stockings, “there’s rum an’ there’s tea. Which will you take to warm yoursel’?”

Mrs. William elected to take rum; and ‘Lizabeth noted that she helped herself with freedom. She made no comment, however, but set about making tea for herself; and, then, drawing up her chair to the table, leant her chin on her hand and intently regarded her visitor.

“Where’s William?” inquired Mrs. Transom.

“Up-stairs.”

“Askin’ his father’s pardon?”

“Well,” ‘Lizabeth grimly admitted, “that’s like enough; but you needn’t fret about them.”

Mrs. William showed no disposition to fret. On the contrary, under the influence of the rum she became weakly jovial and a trifle garrulous– confiding to ‘Lizabeth that, though married to William for four years, she had hitherto been blessed with no children; that they lived in barracks, which she disliked, but put up with because she doted on a red coat; that William had always been meaning to tell his father, but feared to anger him, “because, my dear,” she frankly explained, “I was once connected with the stage”–a form of speech behind which ‘Lizabeth did not pry; that, a fortnight before Christmas, William had made up his mind at last, “‘for,’ as he said to me, ‘the old man must be nearin’ his end, and then the farm’ll be mine by rights;'” that he had obtained his furlough two days back, and come by coach all the way to this doleful spot–for doleful she must call it, though she would have to live there some day–with no shops nor theayters, of which last it appeared Mrs. Transom was inordinately fond. Her chatter was interrupted at length with some abruptness.

“I suppose,” said ‘Lizabeth meditatively, “you was pretty, once.”

Mrs. Transom, with her hand on the bottle, stared, and then tittered.

“Lud! my dear, you ain’t over-complimentary. Yes, pretty I was, though I say it.”

“We ain’t neither of us pretty now–you especially.”

“I’d a knack o’ dressin’,” pursued the egregious Mrs. Transom, “an’ nice eyes an’ hair. ‘Why, Maria, darlin’,’ said William one day, when him an’ me was keepin’ company, ‘I believe you could sit on that hair o’ yours, I do reely.’ ‘Go along, you silly!’ I said, ‘to be sure I can.'”

“He called you darling?”

“Why, in course. H’ain’t you never had a young man?”

‘Lizabeth brushed aside the question by another.

“Do you love him? I mean so that–that you could lie down and let him tramp the life out o’ you?”

“Good Lord, girl, what questions you do ask! Why, so-so, o’ course, like other married women. He’s wild at times, but I shut my eyes; an’ he hav’n struck me this year past. I wonder what he can be doin’ all this time.”