an?" I asked.

My question brought her down suddenly from heaven to earth. "Oh!" she
said reproachfully, "I had his voice still in my ears--and now I have
lost it! 'Who is he?'" she added, after a moment; repeating my question.
"Nobody knows. Tell me--what is he like. Is he beautiful? He _must_ be
beautiful, with that voice!"

"Is this the first time you have heard his voice?" I inquired.

"Yes. He passed us yesterday, when I was out with Zillah. But he never
spoke. What is he like? Do, pray tell me--what is he like?"

There was a passionate impatience in her tone which warned me not to
trifle with her. The darkness was coming. I thought it wise to propose
returning to the house. She consented to do anything I liked, as long as
I consented, on my side, to describe the unknown man.

All the way back, I was questioned and cross-questioned till I felt like
a witness under skillful examination in a court of law. Lucilla appeared
to be satisfied, so far, with the results. "Ah!" she exclaimed, letting
out the secret which her old nurse had confided to me. "_You_ can use
your eyes. Zillah could tell me nothing."

When we got home again, her curiosity took another turn. "Exeter?" she
said, considering with herself. "He mentioned Exeter. I am like you--I
never was there. What will books tell us about Exeter?" She despatched
Zillah to the other side of the house for a gazetteer. I followed the old
woman into the corridor, and set her mind at ease, in a whisper. "I have
kept what you told me a secret," I said. "The man was out in the
twilight, as you foresaw. I have spoken to him; and I am quite as curious
as the rest of you. Get the book."

Lucilla had (to confess the truth) infected me with her idea, that the
gazetteer might help us in interpreting the stranger's remarkable
question relating to the third of last month, and his extraordinary
assertion that I had distressed him when I looked at him. With the nurse
breathless on one side of me, and Lucilla breathless on the other, I
opened the book at the letter "E," and found the place, and read aloud
these lines, as follows:--

"EXETER: A city and seaport in Devonshire. Formerly the seat of the West
Saxon Kings. It has a large foreign and home commerce. Population 33,738.
The Assizes for Devonshire are held at Exeter in the spring and summer."

"Is that all?" asked Lucilla.

I shut the book, and answered, like Finch's boy, in three monosyllabic
words:

"That is all."