When you have been coming to see the countess.

I have taken the liberty of noticing that you come often." "Oh yes; I come very often," said Newman, laughing.

"You need not have been wide-awake to notice that." "I have noticed it with pleasure, sir," said the ancient tire-woman, gravely.

And she stood looking at Newman with a strange expression of face.

The old instinct of deference and humility was there; the habit of decent self-effacement and knowledge of her "own place." But there mingled with it a certain mild audacity, born of the occasion and of a sense, probably, of Newman's unprecedented approachableness, and, beyond this, a vague indifference to the old proprieties; as if my lady's own woman had at last begun to reflect that, since my lady had taken another person, she had a slight reversionary property in herself.
"You take a great interest in the family ?" said Newman.
"A deep interest, sir.