“No, miss; and no person would with nothing but a chop to sit down to. I was told by the gentleman from Mr. Travers' office that brought you here that I was to do my best for you. But how can I do my best for you when you order me to do my worst?” Here she appeared almost at the point of crying. “It is not for me to say anything, but I consider, miss, that you're not doing yourself justice. I mean only with respect to eating and drinking----” with a glance full of meaning at Fan's face, then at her dress. “About other things I haven't anything to say, because I don't interfere with what doesn't concern me.” “But what can I do, Mrs. Fay?” said Fan distressed. “I have not been accustomed to order my meals, but to sit down without knowing what there was to eat. And I like that way best.” Then, in a burst of despair, she added, “Can't you give me just whatever you like, without asking me?” Mrs. Fay's brow cleared, and she smiled as Fan had not seen her smile before. “That I will, miss; and I don't think you'll have any reason to complain that you left it to me.” From that time Fan was compelled to fare delicately, and each day in place of the simple quickly-eaten and soon-forgotten chop, there came to her table a soup with some new flavour, a bit of fish--salmon cutlets, or a couple of smelts, or dainty whitebait with lemon and brown bread-and-butter, or a red mullet in its white wrapper--and exquisitely-tasting little made dishes, and various sweets of unknown names. Nor was there wanting bright colour to relieve the monotony of white napery and please the eye--wine, white and red, in small cut-glass decanters, and rose and amber-coloured wineglasses, and rich-hued fruits and flowers. Of all the delicacies provided for her she tasted, yet never altogether free from the painful thought that while she was thus faring sumptuously, many of her fellow-creatures were going about the streets hungry, even as she had once gone about wishing for a penny to buy a roll. Still, Mrs. Fay was happy now, and that was one advantage gained, although her lodger was paying dearly for it with somebody's money.