“Who might your folks be in Cavendish?” she asked, after a few moments of welcome silence.

“I have no relatives there,” I answered, I am afraid, rather ungraciously.

“Going as governess or nurse girl to some of the aristocracy there?  You don’t look as if you ever did much housework, though.”

“I am going to Mr. Winthrop’s.”

“Deu tell!  Why, I lived with his mother myself, when I was a widder first.”

Then she relapsed into another eloquent pause of silence, while possibly in her dim way she was reflecting how history repeats itself.  But coming back to reality again, and scanning me more closely than ever, she asked, “Are you going there to work?”

My patience was getting exhausted, and it is possible there was a trace of petulance in my voice as I said, “No, I am Mr. Winthrop’s ward.”

“Deu tell!  What is that?”

“He is my guardian.”

“Why, he is a young man for that.  I thought they got elderly men.”

“My father held the same relation to him.”

She was some time taking in the idea, but she said at last, “Oh, I see.”

I took a book from my satchel and began reading; but she did not long permit me to enjoy it; her next remark, however, riveted my attention.

“I wonder if your name isn’t Selwyn.”

“Yes.”

“Deary me, then I have seen your pa and ma long ago at Oaklands; that’s the Winthrop’s place.”

“Please tell me about them.  I never saw them after I was ten years old.  I was sent from India, and then they died.”

I spoke with a slight hesitancy, having first to translate my sentences, as I still thought, in German.

“Well, I wan’t much acquainted with ’em.  Housemaids ain’t in general on friendly terms with the quality, but your ma was so kind to us servants, I’ve always remembered her.  Mrs. Winthrop sot a sight by her.”

“What was that?” I asked, much mystified.

“Oh, she liked them better’n most.”

“Do you recollect their appearance?”

“Yes; your father was a soldier-like, handsome looking man, very tall and pretty stern.  Your ma minded me of a flower, she was so delicate.  They wan’t long married then, but my, they was fond of each other!  Your father just worshipped her.  I heard Mrs. Winthrop say he had a hard time to get her.  Your ma’s folks didn’t want her to marry a soldier.  She was an only child, and they lived in England.  The Winthrops were English, too, as well as your father.”

It was my turn now to fall into a reverie at the strangeness of circumstances, thus causing me to meet this plain, old body, and learning from her incidents about my own dead parents I might otherwise never have known; besides she told it in such a realistic way that, in some mysterious fashion, like mind reading, I seemed to see it all myself through her clear eyes.

“Have you many brothers and sisters?”