d oval
wicker-basket covered with a white cloth, which burden she bore round to
the back door. Of course, she washed for his own household: he had not
thought of that. In the morning sunlight she appeared rather as a sylph
than as a washerwoman; and he could not but think that the slightness
of her figure was as ill adapted to this occupation as her mother's had
been.

But, after all, it was not the washerwoman that he saw now. In front
of her, on the surface of her, was shining out that more real, more
inter-penetrating being whom he knew so well! The occupation of the
subserving minion, the blemishes of the temporary creature who formed
the background, were of the same account in the presentation of the
indispensable one as the supporting posts and framework in a pyrotechnic
display.

She left the house and went homeward by a path of which he was not
aware, having probably changed her course because she had seen him
standing there. It meant nothing, for she had hardly become acquainted
with him; yet that she should have avoided him was a new experience. He
had no opportunity for a further study of her by distant observation,
and hit upon a pretext for bringing her face to face with him. He found
fault with his linen, and directed that the laundress should be sent
for.

'She is rather young, poor little thing,' said the housemaid
apologetically. 'But since her mother's death she has enough to do to
keep above water, and we make shift with her. But I'll tell her, sir.'

'I will see her myself. Send her in when she comes,' said Pierston.

One morning, accordingly, when he was answering a spiteful criticism
of a late work of his, he was told that she waited his pleasure in the
hall. He went out.

'About the washing,' said the sculptor stiffly. 'I am a very particular
person, and I wish no preparation of lime to be used.'

'I didn't know folks used it,' replied the maiden, in a scared and
reserved tone, without looking at him.

'That's all right. And then, the mangling smashes the buttons.'

'I haven't got a mangle, sir,' she murmured.

'Ah! that's satisfactory. And I object to so much borax in the starch.'

'I don't put any,' Avice returned in the same close way; 'never heard
the name o't afore!'

'O I see.'

All this time Pierston was thinking of the girl--or as the scientific
might say, Nature was working her plans for the next generation under
the cloak of a dialogue on linen. He could not read her ind