"Do you know," she said, "I have heard so much about you, that I feel as though I had met you before, Mr. Short."
"We really have met," said John. "Do you remember that hot day when you came to the vicarage and I waked up Muggins for you?"
"Yes—was that you? You have changed. That is, I suppose I did not see you very well in the hurry."
"I suppose I have changed in two years and a half. I was only a boy then, you know. But how have you heard so much about me?"
"Billingsfield," said Mrs. Goddard with a faint smile, "is not a large place. The Ambroses are very fond of you and always talk of what you are doing."
"And so you really live here, Mrs. Goddard? How long is it since you came? Mr. Ambrose never told me—"
"I have been here more than two years—two years last October," she answered quietly.
"The very year I left—only a month after I was gone. How strange!"
Mrs. Goddard looked up nervously. She was frightened lest John should have made any deductions from the date of her arrival. But John was thinking in a very different train of thought.
"Why is it strange?" she asked.