The Buffer's wife responded with a significant nod, and introduced the visitor into the widow's parlour.
Moll Wicks then withdrew to her own room.
Meantime the visitor stood in the presence of Mrs. Smith, who beheld before her a short man, with a pale face, dark piercing eyes, shaggy brows, and long straggling black hair. He was dressed in a respectable suit of mourning, and wore a clean white cravat.
"Pardon me, ma'am, if I intrude," said the visitor; "but my friend Mr. Banks—"
"Oh! sir, you are quite welcome," ejaculated the widow. "Pray sit down, sir. I presume you are the reverend minister—"
"I am a humble vessel of the Lord," answered the visitor, casting down his eyes with great meekness: "and I am come to see in what way I can be useful to a respectable widow of whom my friend, the excellent Mr. Banks, has spoken so very highly."
"The truth is, reverend sir," said the widow, sinking her voice, and drawing her chair closer up to her sanctified visitor, "I want some good advice how to act in a wery partickler matter."
"It is my business to give good advice," was the reply.
"I thought so, reverend sir; and if Mat had been alive, I should have told him that I thought so. Howsomever, this is what I want to know about. An old gentleman dies yesterday morning in my house; and he leaves a little money—thirty or forty pounds, or so—behind him. He always paid his way with me; and so I don't start no claim to a farthing of it. He has no name—no friends—no relations—no nothing: now the question is, sir, what am I to do with this here money that he's left behind him?"
"You are a very honest woman, Mrs. Smith," answered the reverend gentleman; "and you conduct yourself in a most creditable way in this respect. Many people would have put the money into their own pockets."