"What a tiny little world it is!" said Margaret, by way of opening the conversation.
Miss Skeat sat down by the table. She was thin and yellow, and her bones were on the outside. She wore gold-rimmed eyeglasses, and was well dressed, in plain black, with a single white ruffle about her long and sinewy neck. She was hideous, but she had a certain touch of dignified elegance, and her face looked trustworthy and not unkind.
"Apropos of anything especial?" asked she, seeing that the Countess expected her to say something.
"Do you remember when I dropped my parasol at Heidelberg?"
"Perfectly," replied Miss Skeat.
"And the man who picked it up, and who looked like Niemann in Lohengrin?"
"Yes, and who must have been a professor. I remember very well."
"A friend of mine brought a friend of his to see me this afternoon, and the man himself is coming to-morrow."
"What is his name?" asked the lady-companion.
"I am sure I don't know, but Mr. Barker says he is very eccentric. He is very rich, and yet he lives in a garret in Heidelberg and wishes he were poor."