She was pouring out the water, and did not look at me. "I can't say, sir," she answered in a low tone. "Do you remember _me_? That's the better question." She shook her head. "Watts and I lived in Ely Place for some years before we came here, sir," she then said. "It's not impossible you may have seen me in the street when I was doing the steps; but I never saw you pass by that I know of." "And before that, where did you live?" "Before that, sir? At Dover." "Ah! well," I said, for this did not help me out with my puzzle; "I suppose it is fancy." Mr. Brightman caught up the last word as Mrs. Watts withdrew. "Fancy, Charles; that's what it must be. And fancy sometimes plays wonderful tricks with us." "Yes, sir; I expect it is fancy. For all that, I feel perplexed. The woman's voice and manner seem to strike a chord in my memory as much as her face does." * * * * * "Captain Heriot, sir." Sitting one evening in my room at dusk in the summer weather, the window open to the opposite wall and to the side view of the Thames, waiting for Lake to come in, Watts had thus interrupted me to show in Tom Heriot. I started up and grasped his hands. He was a handsome young fellow, with the open manners that had charmed the world in the days gone by, and charmed it still. "Charley, boy! It is good to see you." "Ay, and to see _you_, Tom. Are you staying in London?" "Why, we have been here for days! What a fellow you are, not to know that we are now quartered here. Don't you read the newspapers? It used to be said, you remember, that young Charley lived in a wood." I laughed. "And how are things with you, Tom?" "Rather down; have been for a long time; getting badder and badder." My heart gave a thump. In spite of his laughing air and bright smile, I feared it might be too true. "I am going to the deuce, headlong, Charley." "Don't, Tom!" "Don't what? Not go or not talk of it? It is as sure as death, lad." "Have you made holes in your money?" "Fairly so. I think I may say so, considering that the whole of it is spent." "Oh, Tom!" "Every individual stiver. But upon my honour as a soldier, Charley, other people have had more of it than I. A lot of it went at once, when I came into it, paying off back debts." "What shall you do? You will never make your pay suffice." "Sell out, I expect." "And then?" Tom shrugged his shoulders in answer. They were very slender shoulders. His frame was slight altogether, suggesting that he might not be strong. He was about as tall as I--rather above middle height. "Take a clerkship with you, at twenty shillings a week, if you'd give it me. Or go out to the Australian diggings to pick up gold. How grave you look, Charles!" "It is a grave subject. But I hope you are saying this in joke, Tom."