Chapter XICharles sat in Miss Maud Silver’s waiting-room. He was not one of those who wait patiently. Having arrived at ten o’clock, he was exasperated to find that he was not the first upon the scene; a murmur of female voices stimulated his annoyance. ‘Probably talking millinery,’ was his embittered comment.
Then all of a sudden through the thin partition came a sharp little cry of ‘I can’t!’ The cry had a quality which did not suggest millinery. There was a silence; and then the murmur of voices went on again.
It was almost half past ten before the inner door opened and a woman came out. She kept her head turned away and passed quickly out on to the landing.
Charles entered Miss Silver’s office with a good deal of curiosity, and found himself in a small, light room, very bare—furnish
