“Not back yet?” he inquired, gruffly.

The old lady shook her head.

“What—­what—­is that bill for?” demanded Mr. Davis, jerking his thumb towards it.

“She is thinking of selling the house,” said Mrs. Smith.  “I let her know you had been, and that is, the result.  She won’t comeback.  You won’t see her again.”

“Where is she?” inquired Mr. Davis, frowning.

Mrs. Smith shook her head again.  “And it would be no use my telling you,” she said.  “What she has got is her own, and the law won’t let you touch a penny of it without her consent.  You must have treated her badly; why did you leave her?”

“Why?” repeated Mr. Davis.  “Why?  Why, because she hit me over the ’ead with a broom-handle.”

Mrs. Smith tossed her head.

“Fancy you remembering that for thirty-five years!” she said.

“Fancy forgetting it!” retorted Mr. Davis.

“I suppose she had a hot temper,” said the old lady.

“’Ot temper?” said the other.  “Yes.”  He leaned forward, and holding his chilled hands over the fire stood for some time deep in thought.

“I don’t know what it is,” he said at last, “but there’s a something about you that reminds me of her.  It ain’t your voice, ’cos she had a very nice voice—­when she wasn’t in a temper—­and it ain’t your face, because—­”

“Yes?” said Mrs. Smith, sharply.  “Because it don’t remind me of her.”

“And yet the other day you said you recognized me at once,” said the old lady.

“I thought I did,” said Mr. Davis.  “One thing is, I was expecting to see her, I s’pose.”

There was a long silence.

“Well, I won’t keep you,” said Mrs. Smith at last, “and it’s no good for you to keep coming here to see her.  She will never come here again.  I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but you don’t look over and above respectable.  Your coat is torn, your trousers are patched in a dozen places, and your boots are half off your feet—­I don’t know what the servant must think.”

“I—­I only came to look for my wife,” said Mr. Davis, in a startled voice.  “I won’t come again.”

“That’s right,” said the old lady.  “That’ll please her, I know.  And if she should happen to ask what sort of a living you are making, what shall I tell her?”

“Tell her what you said about my clothes, ma’am,” said Mr. Davis, with his hand on the door-knob.  “She’ll understand then.  She’s known wot it is to be poor herself.  She’d got a bad temper, but she’d have cut her tongue out afore she’d ’ave thrown a poor devil’s rags in his face.  Good-afternoon.”

“Good-afternoon, Ben,” said the old woman, in a changed voice.

Mr. Davis, half-way through the door, started as though he had been shot, and, facing about, stood eyeing her in dumb bewilderment.

“If I take you back again,” repeated his wife, “are you going to behave yourself?”