cottage. Before Mrs. Presty could make any remark on the change
in the weather, he surprised her by an extraordinary question.

"Is there an upper room here, ma'am, which has a view of the road
before your front gate?"

"Certainly!"

"And can I go into it without disturbing anybody?"

Mrs. Presty said, "Of course!" with an uplifting of her eye brows
which expressed astonishment not unmixed with suspicion. "Do you
want to go up now?" she added, "or will you wait till you have
had your breakfast?"

"I want to go up, if you please, before the fog thickens. Oh,
Mrs. Presty, I am ashamed to trouble you! Let the servant show me
the room."

No. For the first time in her life Mrs. Presty insisted on doing
servant's duty. If she had been crippled in both legs her
curiosity would have helped her to get up the stairs on her
hands. "There!" she said, opening the door of the upper room, and
placing herself exactly in the middle of it, so that she could
see all round her: "Will that do for you?"

Mr. Sarrazin went to the window; hid himself behind the curtain;
and cautiously peeped out. In half a minute he turned his back on
the misty view of the road, and said to himself: "Just what I
expected."