recently been cut through the thick wall. In front of this aperture
fluttered a bright pink curtain.

Covering three of the walls as well as the low ceiling, was a paper
simulating white satin powdered with rose-buds, and the bed, draped with
virginal muslin curtains, was a child's rather than a woman's bed.

"What's that?" asked Dampier suddenly. "A cupboard?"

He had noticed that wide double doors, painted in the pale brownish grey
called grisaille, formed the further side of the tiny apartment.

Madame Poulain, turning a key, revealed a large roomy space now fitted up
as a cupboard. "It's a way through into our bedroom, monsieur," she said
smiling. "We could not of course allow our daughter to be far from
ourselves."

And Dampier nodded. He knew the ways of French people and sympathised with
those ways.

He stepped up into the cupboard, curious to see if this too had been a
powdering closet, and if that were so if the old panelling and
ornamentation had remained in their original condition.

Thus for a moment was Dampier concealed from those in the room. And during
that moment there came the sound of footsteps on the staircase, followed by
the sudden appearance on the landing outside the open door of the curious
little apartment of two tall figures--a girl in a lace opera cloak, and a
young man in evening dress.