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Page 24
"Rubbish!" he said sharply. "I'll help you with the lodger. It's
your own fault you haven't had help with him before. Of course,
Daisy must come here. Whatever other place could the girl go to?"
Bunting felt pugnacious--so cheerful as to be almost light-hearted.
But as he looked across at his wife his feeling of satisfaction
vanished. Ellen's face was pinched and drawn to-day; she looked ill
--ill and horribly tired. It was very aggravating of her to go and
behave like this--just when they were beginning to get on nicely
again.
"For the matter of that," he said suddenly, "Daisy'll be able to help
you with the work, Ellen, and she'll brisk us both up a bit."
Mrs. Bunting made no answer. She sat down heavily at the table.
And then she said languidly, "You might as well show me the girl's
letter."
He handed it across to her, and she read it slowly to herself.
"DEAR FATHER (it ran)--I hope this finds you as well at it leaves
me. Mrs. Puddle's youngest has got scarlet fever, and Aunt thinks
I had better come away at once, just to stay with you for a few
days. Please tell Ellen I won't give her no trouble. I'll start
at ten if I don't hear nothing.--Your loving daughter,
"Yes, I suppose Daisy will have to come here," Mrs. Bunting slowly.
"It'll do her good to have a bit of work to do for once in her life."
And with that ungraciously worded permission Bunting had to content
himself.
******
Quietly the rest of that eventful day sped by. When dusk fell Mr.
Sleuth's landlady heard him go upstairs to the top floor. She
remembered that this was the signal for her to go and do his room.
He was a tidy man, was the lodger; he did not throw his things
about as so many gentlemen do, leaving them all over the place.
No, he kept everything scrupulously tidy. His clothes, and the
various articles Mrs. Bunting had bought for him during the first
two days he had been there, were carefully arranged in the chest
of drawers. He had lately purchased a pair of boots. Those he
had arrived in were peculiar-looking footgear, buff leather shoes
with rubber soles, and he had told his landlady on that very first
day that he never wished them to go down to be cleaned.
A funny idea--a funny habit that, of going out for a walk after
midnight in weather so cold and foggy that all other folk were
glad to be at home, snug in bed. But then Mr. Sleuth himself
admitted that he was a funny sort of gentleman.
After she had done his bedroom the landlady went into the
sitting-room and gave it a good dusting. This room was not kept
quite as nice as she would have liked it to be. Mrs. Bunting
longed to give the drawing-room something of a good turn out; but
Mr. Sleuth disliked her to be moving about in it when he himself
was in his bedroom; and when up he sat there almost all the time.
Delighted as he had seemed to be with the top room, he only used
it when making his mysterious experiments, and never during the
day-time.
And now, this afternoon, she looked at the rosewood chiffonnier with
longing eyes--she even gave that pretty little piece of furniture
a slight shake. If only the doors would fly open, as the locked
doors of old cupboards sometimes do, even after they have been
securely fastened, how pleased she would be, how much more
comfortable somehow she would feel!
But the chiffonnier refused to give up its secret.
******
About eight o'clock on that same evening Joe Chandler came in, just
for a few minutes' chat. He had recovered from his agitation of the
morning, but he was full of eager excitement, and Mrs. Bunting
listened in silence, intensely interested in spite of herself, while
he and Bunting talked.
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