She had the oddest little foreign accent. I looked at her again more critically, and discovered what it was that made her look so disreputable. She was wearing an old black dress many sizes too big for her. Great pleats of it were secured by pins in unexpected places, so that quaint chaos was made of the scheme of decoration—black velvet and bugles—on the bodice. Instinctively I felt that a middle-aged, fat, second-hand-clothes-dealing Jewess had built it many years ago for synagogue wear. On the girlish figure it looked preposterous. Preposterous too was her head-gear, an amorphous bonnet trimmed in black, with a cheap black feather drooping brokenly.
Her eyes gave me a reproachful glance and turned away again. Then she shrugged her shoulders and sniffed. My mother had a housemaid once who always sniffed like that before beginning to cry. My position was untenable. I could not remain stonily on the seat while this grotesquely attired damsel wept; and for the life of me I could not get up and leave her. She looked at me again. Those swimming, pleading eyes were scarcely human. I capitulated.
“Don’t cry. Tell me what I can do for you,” I said.
She moved a few inches nearer.
“I want to find Harry,” she said; “I have lost him.”
“Who’s Harry?” I naturally inquired.
“He is to be my husband.”
“What’s his other name?”
“I have forgotten,” she said, spreading out her hands.
“Don’t you know any one else in London?” I asked.