rd and stepped out upon the street with a small covered basket
in her hand, she had gone but a very little distance when she met Mr.
Burke, with his furs, his cane, and his silk hat. The latter was lifted
very high as its owner saluted Miss Croup.

Willy, who was of a fair complexion, reddened somewhat as she shook
hands with the gentleman, informed him, in answer to his questions, that
Mrs. Cliff was very well, that she was very well; that the former was at
home and would be glad to see him, and that she herself was going into
the business part of the town to make some little purchases.

She would have been better pleased if she had not been obliged to tell
him where she was going, but she could not do otherwise when he said he
supposed she was walking for the benefit of the fresh morning air. He
added to her discomfiture by requesting to be allowed to walk with her,
and by offering to carry her basket. This threw Willy's mind into a good
deal of a flutter. Why could she not have met this handsomely dressed
gentleman sometime when she was not going to the grocery store to buy
such things as stove-blacking and borax?

It seemed to her as if these commodities must suggest to the mind of any
one rusty iron and obtrusive insects, and as articles altogether outside
the pale of allusion in high-toned social intercourse.

It also struck her as a little odd that a gentleman should propose to
accompany a lady when she was going on domestic errands; but then this
gentleman was different from any she had known, and there were many ways
of the world with which she was not at all acquainted.

Mr. Burke immediately began to speak of the visit of the day before. He
had enjoyed seeing Mrs. Cliff again and he had never sat down to a
better dinner.

"Yes," said Willy, "she likes good eatin', and she knows what it is, and
if she had a bigger dining-room she would often invite people to dinner,
and I expect the house would be quite lively, as she seems more given to
company than she used to be, and that's all right, considerin' she's
better able to afford it."

Mr. Burke took a deep satisfied breath. The opportunity had already come
to him to speak his mind.

"Afford it!" said he. "I should think so! Mrs. Cliff must be very rich.
She is worth, I should say--well, I don't know what to say, not knowing
exactly and precisely what each person got when the grand division was
made."

Willy's loyalty to Mrs. Cliff prompted her to put h