ithout knowing that she said it
at all.

It was a picturesque old house in Surrey. The house stood in a hollow,
and the road wound up past it on to a long rolling wold. (That is
the beautiful word your poet Tennyson uses. The country-people, the
peasantry, use it also.) She had cried so much that her eyes were ready
for tears again at almost anything. When she looked at me they were
brim-full, but they did not run over.

'We lived here with papa,' she said, 'till he died.'

Then two big tears brimmed over and ran down. I committed an
indiscretion: I was sorry for her, and I kissed her. She drew away with
much dignity and said--

'I have stayed too long. Good morning, signor.'

I blushed. She was so much a child, and I feel myself so old, that I
had not thought it any indiscretion. And now I remember that I have been
writing of her as a child. She is quite a grown girl--a young lady. She
is perhaps more than seventeen years of age. I was a brute beast--an
insensate--to frighten her. Before I could say anything she was gone.

I abused myself in my vehement Continental way, and then I began to
work. The picture was but little hurt, and before daylight was over
it was almost repaired. But I had heard the clock strike seven, and my
estimable uncle round the corner retires at that hour into the country,
and will have no business again until nine o'clock in the morning. So,
to prevent myself from thinking too much of the coffee and the tobacco
and the loaf, I sat down to my piano and played. One would have thought
that my sitting down to play was a signal, for I had scarcely begun when
my landlady tapped at my door and brought a note. She looked shyly at
the picture, and hoped it had not suffered much. I told her gaily that
it was all the better for the accident, as in reality it was. Then I
read my note.

'Miss Grammont presents her compliments to Signor Calvotti,
and requests that he will oblige her by his company at tea
this evening. Miss Grammont begs that Signor Calvotti will
forgive this intrusion, and will forget that no formal
introduction has taken place between them.'

I read this over twice, and then asked the landlady--

'Who is Miss Grammont?'

'She's the sister of the young lady who had the accident with your
picture, sir,' said the landlady. 'She's a middle-aged lady, sir, and
very badly lame. But she's got an angel temper, and ways that sweet as I
never saw anybody like her