loted in by the man,
man.

'I have not the pleasure,' said Mr Dorrit, standing with the card in his
hand, and with an air which imported that it would scarcely have been a
first-class pleasure if he had had it, 'of knowing either this name, or
yourself, madam. Place a chair, sir.' The responsible man, with a start,
obeyed, and went out on tiptoe. Flora, putting aside her veil with a
bashful tremor upon her, proceeded to introduce herself. At the same
time a singular combination of perfumes was diffused through the room,
as if some brandy had been put by mistake in a lavender-water bottle, or
as if some lavender-water had been put by mistake in a brandy-bottle.

'I beg Mr Dorrit to offer a thousand apologies and indeed they would
be far too few for such an intrusion which I know must appear extremely
bold in a lady and alone too, but I thought it best upon the whole
however difficult and even apparently improper though Mr F.'s Aunt would
have willingly accompanied me and as a character of great force and
spirit would probably have struck one possessed of such a knowledge of
life as no doubt with so many changes must have been acquired, for Mr F.
himself said frequently that although well educated in the neighbourhood
of Blackheath at as high as eighty guineas which is a good deal for
parents and the plate kept back too on going away but that is more a
meanness than its value that he had learnt more in his first years as a
commercial traveller with a large commission on the sale of an article
that nobody would hear of much less buy which preceded the wine trade
a long time than in the whole six years in that academy conducted by a
college Bachelor, though why a Bachelor more clever than a married man I
do not see and never did but pray excuse me that is not the point.'

Mr Dorrit stood rooted to the carpet, a statue of mystification.

'I must openly admit that I have no pretensions,' said Flora, 'but
having known the dear little thing which under altered circumstances
appears a liberty but is not so intended and Goodness knows there was no
favour in half-a-crown a-day to such a needle as herself but quite the
other way and as to anything lowering in it far from it the labourer is
worthy of his hire and I am sure I only wish he got it oftener and more
animal food and less rheumatism in the back and legs poor soul.'

'Madam,' said Mr Dorrit, recovering his breath by a great effort, as the
relict of the late Mr Finching