The next morning when Gabriella, in a Parisian gown of black taffeta and one of the absurdly small hats of the autumn, started for Dinard’s, she found herself thinking, not of Fanny’s flirtation, but of her long talk with O’Hara.  She cast a friendly glance on the golden-oak hatrack as she passed—­for O’Hara had risen in her regard since she had discovered that he had not selected the furniture on the first floor—­and then stopping for a few moments on the front steps, she closed her eyes, and inhaled the fragrance of the mignonette in the window box.  The yard was brilliant in the early sunshine; and at the gate she saw the wife of the caretaker, who had looked after the flowers in her absence.  Detaining the woman by a gesture, she joined her in the street, and the two started together to walk the long blocks that stretched to Fifth Avenue.

“You are going home early to-day, Mrs. Squires.”

“Yes, ma’am; it’s Johnny’s birthday and I promised to take him up to the Bronx.  Mr. O’Hara had his breakfast at seven, and I got through earlier than usual.  He is so tidy that there ain’t much to do except to dust around a little.”

She was a neat, red-faced woman, in rusty mourning for a child she had lost in the early summer, and while she talked, Gabriella felt an irresistible impulse to question her about O’Hara.  “She has known him for thirty years, and I can find out more from her than I could discover for myself in six months,” she thought; but she only said indifferently: 

“You’ve worked at this house a long time, haven’t you?”

“For thirty years—­ever since I came here at eighteen as housemaid to Mr. McGoldrick.  My husband was coachman for Mr. McGoldrick, you know—­he drove the prettiest pair of bays in New York—­and that was how I met him.  When we married, Mr. McGoldrick set us up, and John drove his carriage for him as long as he lived.  I often wonder what the old gentleman would think of everybody having automobiles.  They were just beginning to come into fashion when he died.”

“You knew Mr. O’Hara then?”

“Oh, yes, he was a great deal with Mr. McGoldrick.  After he went West we didn’t see much of him for a time—­that was while he was making his money.  Then he came back and brought his wife to a place here to be treated—­”

“His wife?”

“Didn’t you know?  She died a few years ago, but before that he used to keep her with some doctor over on Long Island, and he went regularly to see her every Sunday afternoon as long as she lived.”

“What was the matter?”

“Drugs.  Drugs and drink, too, they said, though I never knew for certain about that.  But they couldn’t do anything with her.  They tried all the cures anybody ever heard of, and she went back every time.  No sooner would one thing fail, however, than Mr. O’Hara would hear of something or other over in Europe, and make them begin trying it.  Finally for the last ten or twelve years she was quite out of her mind—­clean crazy they said, and didn’t know anybody.  But he still went to see her every Sunday when he was staying in town, and he still made the doctors go on trying new things.  He never gave up till the very last.  Mr. McGoldrick used to say of him that he was the sort that would go on hoping in hell.”