There were not many people in the parish, besides Martha, who had any very distinct remembrance of Mr. Gilfil’s wife, or indeed who knew anything of her, beyond the fact that there was a marble tablet, with a Latin inscription in memory of her, over the vicarage pew. The parishioners who were old enough to remember her arrival were not generally gifted with descriptive powers, and the utmost you could gather from them was, that Mrs. Gilfil looked like a ‘furriner, wi’ such eyes, you can’t think, an’ a voice as went through you when she sung at church.’ The one exception was Mrs. Patten, whose strong memory and taste for personal narrative made her a great source of oral tradition in Shepperton. Mr. Hackit, who had not come into the parish until ten years after Mrs. Gilfil’s death, would often put old questions to Mrs. Patten for the sake of getting the old answers, which pleased him in the same way as passages from a favourite book, or the scenes of a familiar play, please more accomplished people.
‘Ah, you remember well the Sunday as Mrs. Gilfil first come to church, eh, Mrs. Patten?’
‘To be sure I do. It was a fine bright Sunday as ever was seen, just at the beginnin’ o’ hay harvest. Mr. Tarbett preached that day, and Mr. Gilfil sat i’ the pew with his wife. I think I see him now, a-leading her up the aisle, an’ her head not reachin’ much above his elber: a little pale woman, with eyes as black as sloes, an’ yet lookin’ blank-like, as if she see’d nothing with ’em.’
‘I warrant she had her weddin’ clothes on?’ said Mr. Hackit.
‘Nothin’ partikler smart—on’y a white hat tied down under her chin, an’ a white Indy muslin gown. But you don’t know what Mr. Gilfil was in those times. He was fine an’ altered before you come into the parish. He’d a fresh colour then, an’ a bright look wi’ his eyes, as did your heart good to see. He looked rare and happy that Sunday; but somehow, I’d a feelin’ as it wouldn’t last long. I’ve no opinion o’ furriners, Mr. Hackit, for I’ve travelled i’ their country with my lady in my time, an’ seen enough o’ their victuals an’ their nasty ways.’
‘Mrs. Gilfil come from It’ly, didn’t she?’
‘I reckon she did, but I niver could rightly hear about that. Mr. Gilfil was niver to be spoke to about her, and nobody else hereabout knowed anythin’. Howiver, she must ha’ come over pretty young, for she spoke English as well as you an’ me. It’s them Italians as has such fine voices, an’ Mrs. Gilfil sung, you never heared the like. He brought her here to have tea with me one afternoon, and says he, in his jovial way, “Now, Mrs. Patten, I want Mrs. Gilfil to see the neatest house, and drink the best cup o’ tea, in all Shepperton; you must show her your dairy and your cheese-room, and then she shall sing you a song.” An’ so she did; an’ her voice seemed sometimes to fill the room; an’ then it went low an’ soft, as if it was whisperin’ close to your heart like.’
‘You never heared her again, I reckon?’
‘No; she was sickly then, and she died in a few months after. She wasn’t in the parish much more nor half a year altogether. She didn’t seem lively that afternoon, an’ I could see she didn’t care about the dairy, nor the cheeses, on’y she pretended, to please him. As for him, I niver see’d a man so wrapt up in a woman. He looked at her as if he was worshippin’ her, an’ as if he wanted to lift her off the ground ivery minute, to save her the trouble o’ walkin’. Poor man, poor man! It had like to ha’ killed him when she died, though he niver gev way, but went on ridin’ about and preachin’. But he was wore to a shadder, an’ his eyes used to look as dead—you wouldn’t ha’ knowed ’em.’
‘She brought him no fortune?’