I come to see my Lady Eglington." Now she remembered him.

She had seen him in Hamley more than once.
"You have come far; have you important news for her ladyship?
Is there anything wrong ?" she asked with apparent composure, but with heavy premonition.
"Ay, news that counts, I bring," answered Soolsby, "or I hadn't come this long way.

'Tis a long way at sixty-five." "Well, yes, at our age it is a long way," rejoined the Duchess in a friendly voice, suddenly waving away the intervening air of class, for she was half a peasant at heart.
"Ay, and we both come for the same end, I suppose," Soolsby added; "and a costly business it is.

But what matters, so be that you help her ladyship and I help Our Man." "And who is 'Our Man' ?" was the rejoinder.

"Him that's coming safe here from the South--David Claridge," he answered.