s certain that Peregrine Oakshott was the
plague of the Close, where his father, an ex-officer of the
Parliamentary army, had unwillingly hired a house for the winter,
for the sake of medical treatment for his wife, a sufferer from a
complication of ailments. Oakwood, his home, was about five miles
from Dr. Woodford's living of Portchester, and as the families would
thus be country neighbours, Mrs. Woodford thought it well to begin
the acquaintance at Winchester. While knocking at the door of the
house on the opposite side of the Close, she was aware of an elfish
visage peering from an upper window. There was the queer mop of
dark hair, the squinting light eyes, the contorted grin crooking the
mouth, the odd sallow face, making her quite glad to get out of
sight of the strange grimaces which grew every moment more hideous.

Mrs. Oakshott sat in an arm-chair beside a large fire in a
wainscotted room, with a folding-screen shutting off the window.
Her spinning-wheel was near, but it was only too plain that 'feeble
was the hand, and silly the thread.' She bent her head in its
wadded black velvet hood, but excused herself from rising, as she
was crippled by rheumatic pains. She had evidently once been a
pretty little person, innocent and inane, and her face had become
like that of a withered baby, piteous in its expression of pain and
weariness, but otherwise somewhat vacant. At first, indeed, there
was a look of alarm. Perhaps she expected every visitor to come
with a complaint of her unlucky Peregrine, but when Mrs. Woodford
spoke cheerfully of being her neighbour in the country, she was
evidently relieved and even gratified, prattling in a soft plaintive
tone about her sufferings and the various remedies, ranging from
woodlice rolled into natural pills, and grease off the church bells,
to diamond dust and Goa stones, since, as she said, there was no
cost to which Major Oakshott would not go for her benefit. He had
even procured for her a pound of the Queen's new Chinese herb, and
it certainly was as nauseous as could be wished, when boiled in
milk, but she was told that was not the way it was taken at my Lady
Charnock's. She was quite animated when Mrs. Woodford offered to
show her how to prepare it.

Therewith the master of the house came in, and the aspect of affairs
changed. He was a tall, dark, grave man, plainly though handsomely
dressed, and in a gentlemanly way making it evident that visits to
his wif