Medlicott told me she noticed a preternatural sensitiveness of ear in Madame de Crequy, induced by the habit of listening silently for the slightest unusual sound in the house.
Medlicott was always a minute watcher of any one whom she cared about; and, one day, she made me notice by a sign madame's acuteness of hearing, although the quick expectation was but evinced for a moment in the turn of the eye, the hushed breath--and then, when the unusual footstep turned into my lord's apartments, the soft quivering sigh, and the closed eyelids.
"At length the intendant of the De Crequy estates--the old man, you will remember, whose information respecting Virginie de Crequy first gave Clement the desire to return to Paris,--came to St.James's Square, and begged to speak to me.

I made haste to go down to him in the housekeeper's room, sooner than that he should be ushered into mine, for fear of madame hearing any sound.
"The old man stood--I see him now--with his hat held before him in both his hands; he slowly bowed till his face touched it when I came in.

Such long excess of courtesy augured ill.

He waited for me to speak.
"'Have you any intelligence ?' I inquired.

He had been often to the house before, to ask if we had received any news; and once or twice I had seen him, but this was the first time he had begged to see me.
"'Yes, madame,' he replied, still standing with his head bent down, like a child in disgrace.
"'And it is bad!' I exclaimed.
"'It is bad.' For a moment I was angry at the cold tone in which my words were echoed; but directly afterwards I saw the large, slow, heavy tears of age falling down the old man's cheeks, and on to the sleeves of his poor, threadbare coat.
"I asked him how he had heard it: it seemed as though I could not all at once bear to hear what it was.