“But I insisted on satisfying myself, and would not be content until she had suffered to peep out beneath the hem of her gown one of the neatest little patent-leather slippers I had ever seen in my life. I said that they were very dainty little things, but altogether fine-weather shoes, and not meant for wet decks. But I remembered presently that I had seen in her hand, when she entered the room, a pair of India-rubber overshoes, and I reminded her of them. “‘They are my mistress’s,’ she said: ‘I had been desired to fetch them from the shop.’ “‘Wear them,’ I said, ‘all the same—they will be none the worse, and will keep your little feet dry.’ “‘But how can I?’ she answered with a smile; ‘they will not fit me at all.’ “‘Too _small_?’ I said, laughing. “‘Yes, sir,’ she said, with another smile, even more charming than the first. I told her that I should not be satisfied until I had decided that point for myself; and at last I persuaded her to try. The little rogue knew well the result. Her feet were quite lost in them. “If I have a weakness in the world, my good fellow, it is in favor of pretty feet and ankles; so, when Rachel insisted on taking her departure, I hobbled as well as I could to the window to see her pick her way across the puddles in the Close. I satisfied myself that the girl’s ankles were as undeniable as her feet; and she was unequivocally _bien chaussée_. I could not help thinking of this long after she was gone. And then it occurred to me that Julia Harper was certainly on a rather large scale. She had a good figure of its kind, and she had fine eyes; but Rachel’s were quite as bright, and much softer; and as for all the essentials of a graceful and feminine figure, the mistress’s was far inferior to the maid’s. I kept thinking of this all the evening, and after I had gone to bed. And I thought, too, of the very unpleasant specimen of Julia’s insincerity which had betrayed itself in the case of the slippers. But it is astonishing how little it pained me to think that Julia might not be really attached to me, and that our almost engagement might come to naught after all.