Crossing a small court on his way to his aerie, he saw the housekeeper making signs to him from the window of her room.
He turned and went to her.

It was of Eppy she wanted to speak to him! How often is the discovery of a planet, of a truth, of a scientific fact, made at once in different places far apart! She asked him to sit down, and got him a glass of milk, which was his favourite refreshment, little imagining the expression she attributed to fatigue arose from the very thing occupying her own thoughts.
"It's a queer thing," she began, "for an auld wife like me to come til a yoong gentleman like yersel', sir, wi' sic a tale; but, as the sayin' is, 'needs maun whan the deil drives'; an' here's like to be an unco stramash aboot the place, gien we comena thegither upo' some gait oot o' 't.

Dinna luik sae scaret like, sir; we may be in time yet er' the warst come to the warst, though it's some ill to say what may be the warst in sic an ill coopered kin' o' affair! There's thae twa fules o' bairns--troth, they're nae better; an' the tane 's jist as muckle to blame as the tither--only the lass is waur to blame nor the lad, bein' made sharper, an' kennin' better nor him what comes o' sic!--Eh, but she is a gowk!" Here Mrs.Brookes paused, lost in contemplation of the gowkedness of Eppy.
She was a florid, plump, good-looking woman, over forty, with thick auburn hair, brushed smooth--one of those women comely in soul as well as body, who are always to the discomfiture of wrong and the healing of strife.

Left a young widow, she had refused many offers: once was all that was required of her in the way of marriage! She had found her husband good enough not to be followed by another, and marriage hard enough to favour the same result.

When she sat down, smoothing her apron on her lap, and looking him in the face with clear blue eyes, he must have been either a suspicious or an unfortunate man who would not trust her.