Gilchrist advanced a step into the room, with much embarrassment in her honest face. She uttered a broken laugh, which was like a giggle, and began as usual to fold hems in her apron.
“I cannot say, mem, that I see a resemblance to any person,” she said.
“You are just a stupid creature!” said her mistress,—“good for nothing but to make an invalid’s beef tea. Just go away, go away and do that.” She turned suddenly to young Gordon, as Gilchrist went out of the room. “That stupid woman’s face doesn’t bring anything to your mind?” she said hastily.
“Bring anything to my mind?” he cried, with great surprise. “What should she bring to my mind?”
“It was just a fancy that came into mine. Do you remember the scene in Guy Mannering, where Bertram first sees Dominie Sampson? Eh, I hope your education has not been neglected in that great particular?”
“I remember the scene,” he said, with a smile.
“It was perhaps a little of what you young folk call melodramatic: but Harry Bertram’s imagination gets a kind of shock, and he remembers. And so you are a reader of Sir Walter, and mind that scene?”
“I remember it very well,” said the young man, bewildered. “But about the maid? You said——”
“Oh, nothing about the maid; she’s my faithful maid, but a stupid woman as ever existed. Never you mind what I said. I say things that are very silly from time to time. But I would like to know how you ever heard your mother was living, when you have never seen her, nor know anything about her? I suppose not even her name?”
“My father told me so when he was dying: he told Mr. Bristow so, but he gave us no further information. I gathered that my mother—— It is painful to betray such an impression.”