"My love?"

"I can't find the saucepan."

A lady appeared at the hatch of the doorway above. Her hair hung in
disarray over her well-developed shoulders, and recent tears had left
their furrows on a painted but not uncomely face.

"I--I--well, to confess the truth, I pawned it, my bud. Dear, every
cloud has its silver lining, and meanwhile what shall we say to a simple
fry? You have an incomparable knack of frying."

"But where's the dripping?"

Her husband groaned.

"The dripping! The continual dripping! Am I--forgive the bitterness of
the question--but am I a stone, love?"

He asked it with a hollow laugh, and at the same time with a glance
challenged Sam's approval for his desperate pleasantry.

Sam jerked his thumb to indicate a wooden out-house on the far side of
the yard.

"I got a shanty of my own across there, _and_ a few fixin's. If the van's
anchored here, an' I can set you up with odds-an'-ends such as a
saucepan, you're welcome."

"A friend in need, sir, is a friend indeed," said the stranger
impressively; and Sam's face brightened, for he had heard the proverb
before, and it promised to bring the conversation, which he had found
some difficulty in following, down to safe, familiar ground. "Allow me
to introduce you--but excuse me, I have not the pleasure of knowing your
name--"

"Sam Bossom."

"Delighted! 'Bossom' did you say? B--O--double S--it should have been
'Blossom,' sir, with a slight addition; or, with an equally slight
omission--er--'Bosom,' if my Arabella will excuse me. On two hands, Mr.
Bossom, you narrowly escape poetry." (Sam looked about him uneasily.)
"But, as Browning says, 'The little more and how much it is, the little
less and what miles away.' Mine is Mortimer, sir--Stanislas Horatio
Mortimer. You have doubtless heard of it?"

"Can't say as I 'ave," Sam confessed.

"Is it possible?" Mr. Mortimer was plainly surprised, not to say hurt.
He knit his brows, and for a moment seemed to be pondering darkly.
"You hear it, Arabella? But no matter. As I was saying, sir, I desire
the pleasure of introducing you to my wife, Mrs. Mortimer, better known
to fame, perhaps, as Miss Arabella St. Maur. You see her, Mr. Bossom,
as my helpmeet under circumstances which (though temporarily
unfavourable) call forth the true woman--naked, in a figurative sense,
and unadorned. But her Ophelia, sir, has been favourably, nay
enthusiastically, approved by some of the best cri