"Do you know what I said to myself as you slid away behind the heavy stair guards?"
"Probably that you wondered why the Feltons harbored such a barbarian."
"No, that I wished that I might meet you again six or seven years hence; and you see I have my wish."
Noticing that Poppea seemed once more inclined to withdraw into herself, Winslow dropped the personal tone that he had been forcing into the conversation and sought more neutral ground in his next venture.
"If, as I understand, you have lived about here all your life, you can give me some help in a little matter of business, that, combined with pleasure, brought me here. I suppose, of course, that you know every resident in the town?"
"Most surely, as well as almost every one who comes to or goes through it;" Poppea was going to add, "because all news comes to the post-office," but a sudden influence caused her to suppress the last sentence.
"Very good, now I will explain my errand, if you have the patience to listen, and I have confidence in asking that what I say will go no further, because the matter concerns others rather than myself."
Poppea, nodding her head in assent, leaned forward, her lips slightly parted in an attitude of undivided attention.
"A cousin of mine, a young New Yorker, who is working his way into politics via being secretary to the postmaster-general, was intrusted to look up a matter in this vicinity during a week of vacation. Meeting me at the club a couple of days ago and finding I was coming here, he asked me to help him out by doing the investigating and letting him spend his time in town.
"It seems that Postmaster Gilbert, here at Harley's Mills, is getting rather old and doddering, and has for his assistant a young woman, a foundling or something, that he has brought up. Complaints have been coming in for the past year of the conduct of the office from a man who is not only a prominent resident here, but one who has strong political influence both in New York and Washington."