Very,” said Richard.

“She was a handsome woman! or I should say, is, for her day ain’t past, and she know it.  I thought at first—­by her back—­it might ha’ been your aunt, Mrs. Forey; for she do step out well and hold up her shoulders:  straight as a dart she be!  But when I come to see her face—­Oh, dear me! says I, this ain’t one of the family.  They none of ’em got such bold faces—­nor no lady as I know have.  But she’s a fine woman—­that nobody can gainsay.”

Mrs. Berry talked further of the fine woman.  It was a liberty she took to speak in this disrespectful tone of her, and Mrs. Berry was quite aware that she was laying herself open to rebuke.  She had her end in view.  No rebuke was uttered, and during her talk she observed intercourse passing between the eyes of the young men.

“Look here, Penelope,” Richard stopped her at last.  “Will it make you comfortable if I tell you I’ll obey the laws of my nature and go down at the end of the week?”

“I’ll thank the Lord of heaven if you do!” she exclaimed.

“Very well, then—­be happy—­I will.  Now listen.  I want you to keep your rooms for me—­those she had.  I expect, in a day or two, to bring a lady here”—­

“A lady?” faltered Mrs. Berry.

“Yes.  A lady.”

“May I make so bold as to ask what lady?”

“You may not.  Not now.  Of course you will know.”

Mrs. Berry’s short neck made the best imitation it could of an offended swan’s action.  She was very angry.  She said she did not like so many ladies, which natural objection Richard met by saying that there was only one lady.

“And Mrs. Berry,” he added, dropping his voice.  “You will treat her as you did my dear girl, for she will require not only shelter but kindness.  I would rather leave her with you than with any one.  She has been very unfortunate.”

His serious air and habitual tone of command fascinated the softness of Berry, and it was not until he had gone that she spoke out.  “Unfort’nate!  He’s going to bring me an unfort’nate female!  Oh! not from my babe can I bear that!  Never will I have her here!  I see it.  It’s that bold-faced woman he’s got mixed up in, and she’ve been and made the young man think he’ll go for to reform her.  It’s one o’ their arts—­ that is; and he’s too innocent a young man to mean anythin’ else.  But I ain’t a house of Magdalens no! and sooner than have her here I’d have the roof fall over me, I would.”

She sat down to eat her supper on the sublime resolve.

In love, Mrs. Berry’s charity was all on the side of the law, and this is the case with many of her sisters.  The Pilgrim sneers at them for it, and would have us credit that it is their admirable instinct which, at the expense of every virtue save one, preserves the artificial barrier simply to impose upon us.  Men, I presume, are hardly fair judges, and should stand aside and mark.