Imagine an absolutely naked little girl of three, sitting in a tub of sunlight in the very doorway.

Clara had turned swiftly and closed the wicket gate between the pebbled pathway and the mossed steps that led down to where her coachman and her footman were sitting very still, as was the habit of those people.

She had perceived at once that she was making no common call.

Then, with real courage she had advanced, and, looking down at the little girl with a fearful smile, had tickled the door with the handle of her green parasol.

A woman younger than herself, a girl, indeed, appeared in a low doorway.