life before had she though of her
maids, or of anybody else, as dusty old things. Her maids were not
dusty old things; they were most respectable, neat women, who were
allowed the use of the bathroom every Saturday night. Elderly,
certainly, but then so was she, so was her house, so was her furniture,
so were her goldfish. They were all elderly, as they should be,
together. But there was a great difference between being elderly and
being a dusty old thing.

How true it was what Ruskin said, that evil communications
corrupt good manners. But did Ruskin say it? On second thoughts she
was not sure, but it was just the sort of thing he would have said if
he had said it, and in any case it was true. Merely hearing Mrs.
Wilkins's evil communications at meals--she did not listen, she avoided
listening, yet it was evident she had heard--those communications which,
in that they so often were at once vulgar, indelicate and profane, and
always, she was sorry to say, laughed at by Lady Caroline, must be
classed as evil, was spoiling her own mental manners. Soon she might
not only think but say. How terrible that would be. If that were the
form her breaking-out was going to take, the form of unseemly speech,
Mrs. Fisher was afraid she would hardly with any degree of composure be
able to bear it.

At this stage Mrs. Fisher wished more than ever that she were
able to talk over her strange feelings with some one who would
understand. There was, however, no one who would understand except
Mrs. Wilkins herself. She would. She would know at once, Mrs. Fisher
was sure, what she felt like. But this was impossible. It would be as
abject as begging the very microbe that was infecting one for
protection against its disease.

She continued, accordingly, to bear her sensations in silence,
and was driven by them into that frequent aimless appearing in the top
garden which presently roused even Scrap's attention.

Scrap had noticed it, and vaguely wondered at it, for some time
before Mr. Wilkins inquired of her one morning as he arranged her
cushions for her--he had established the daily assisting of Lady
Caroline into her chair as his special privilege--whether there was
anything the matter with Mrs. Fisher.

At that moment Mrs. Fisher was standing by the eastern parapet,
shading her eyes and carefully scrutinizing the distant white houses of
Mezzago. They could see her through the branches of the daphnes.

"I don't know,