She was a small slight creature, one of those slender little girls one never thinks of as being a woman, dressed neatly and plainly in a dark dress, with a veil hanging a little over her face and tied under her chin: the most noticeable thing about her appearance being a great mass of light hair, almost yellow, which had got loose in some way, and fell down her neck in thick wavy tresses. She had a free pleasant way about her, not in the least bold or forward, which in a minute or two made her presence seem the most natural thing in the world. As she stood beside me before the row of boxes into which I was sorting my letters, she asked questions and I answered as if it were quite an every-day occurrence for us to be travelling up together in the night mail to Euston-square station. I blamed myself for an idiot that I had not sooner made an opportunity for visiting my unknown friends at Eaton. “Then,” I said, putting down the letter-bill from their own office before her, “may I ask which of the signatures I know so well, is yours? Is it A. Clifton, or M. Clifton, or S. Clifton?” She hesitated a little, and blushed, and lifted up her frank childlike eyes to mine. “I am A. Clifton,” she answered. “And your name?” I said. “Anne;” then, as if anxious to give some explanation to me of her present position, she added, “I was going up to London on a visit, and I thought it would be so nice to travel in the post-office to see how the work was done, and Mr. Huntingdon came to survey our office, and he said he would send me an order.” I felt somewhat surprised, for a stricter martinet than Mr. Huntingdon did not breathe; but I glanced down at the small innocent face at my side, and cordially approved of his departure from ordinary rules. “Did you know you would travel with me?” I asked, in a lower voice; for Tom Morville, my junior, was at my other elbow. “I knew I should travel with Mr. Wilcox,” she answered, with a smile that made all my nerves tingle. “You have not written me a word for ages,” said I, reproachfully. “You had better not talk, or you’ll be making mistakes,” she replied, in an arch tone. It was quite true; for, a sudden confusion coming over me, I was sorting the letters at random. We were just then approaching the small station where the letter-bag from the great house was taken up. The engine was slackening speed. Miss Clifton manifested some natural and becoming diffidence. “It would look so odd,” she said, “to any one on the platform, to see a girl in the post-office van! And they couldn’t know I was a postmaster’s daughter, and had an order from Mr. Huntingdon. Is there no dark corner to shelter me?”