She inspected Gower and heard him speak.

An anomaly had come to the house; for he had the language of a gentleman, the appearance of a nondescript; he looked indifferent, he spoke sympathetically; and he was frank as soon as the butler was out of hearing.

In return for the compliment, she invited him to her sitting-room.

The story of the young countess, whom she had seen driven away by her husband from the church in a coach and four, as being now destitute, praying to see her friends, in the Whitechapel of London--the noted haunt of thieves and outcasts, bankrupts and the abandoned; set her asking for the first time, who was the man with dreadful countenance inside the coach?
A previously disregarded horror of a man.

She went trembling to the admiral, though his health was delicate, his temper excitable.