‘I warrant she had her weddin’ clothes on?’ said Mr. Hackit.

‘Nothin’ partikler smart—­on’y a white hat tied down under her chin, an’ a white Indy muslin gown.  But you don’t know what Mr. Gilfil was in those times.  He was fine an’ altered before you come into the parish.  He’d a fresh colour then, an’ a bright look wi’ his eyes, as did your heart good to see.  He looked rare and happy that Sunday; but somehow, I’d a feelin’ as it wouldn’t last long.  I’ve no opinion o’ furriners, Mr. Hackit, for I’ve travelled i’ their country with my lady in my time, an’ seen enough o’ their victuals an’ their nasty ways.’

‘Mrs. Gilfil come from It’ly, didn’t she?’

’I reckon she did, but I niver could rightly hear about that.  Mr. Gilfil was niver to be spoke to about her, and nobody else hereabout knowed anythin’.  Howiver, she must ha’ come over pretty young, for she spoke English as well as you an’ me.  It’s them Italians as has such fine voices, an’ Mrs. Gilfil sung, you never heared the like.  He brought her here to have tea with me one afternoon, and says he, in his jovial way, “Now, Mrs. Patten, I want Mrs. Gilfil to see the neatest house, and drink the best cup o’ tea, in all Shepperton; you must show her your dairy and your cheese-room, and then she shall sing you a song.”  An’ so she did; an’ her voice seemed sometimes to fill the room; an’ then it went low an’ soft, as if it was whisperin’ close to your heart like.’

‘You never heared her again, I reckon?’

’No; she was sickly then, and she died in a few months after.  She wasn’t in the parish much more nor half a year altogether.  She didn’t seem lively that afternoon, an’ I could see she didn’t care about the dairy, nor the cheeses, on’y she pretended, to please him.  As for him, I niver see’d a man so wrapt up in a woman.  He looked at her as if he was worshippin’ her, an’ as if he wanted to lift her off the ground ivery minute, to save her the trouble o’ walkin’.  Poor man, poor man!  It had like to ha’ killed him when she died, though he niver gev way, but went on ridin’ about and preachin’.  But he was wore to a shadder, an’ his eyes used to look as dead—­you wouldn’t ha’ knowed ’em.’

‘She brought him no fortune?’

’Not she.  All Mr. Gilfil’s property come by his mother’s side.  There was blood an’ money too, there.  It’s a thousand pities as he married i’ that way—­a fine man like him, as might ha’ had the pick o’ the county, an’ had his grandchildren about him now.  An’ him so fond o’ children, too.’

In this manner Mrs. Patten usually wound up her reminiscences of the Vicar’s wife, of whom, you perceive, she knew but little.  It was clear that the communicative old lady had nothing to tell of Mrs. Gilfil’s history previous to her arrival in Shepperton, and that she was unacquainted with Mr. Gilfil’s love-story.

But I, dear reader, am quite as communicative as Mrs. Patten, and much better informed; so that, if you care to know more about the Vicar’s courtship and marriage, you need only carry your imagination back to the latter end of the last century, and your attention forward into the next chapter.