A bat in the eye with a burnt stick reminded him vaguely of encounters with the police; otherwise it conveyed no meaning to his mind.
"I hope you haven't got to go on duty at once," she said after a pause. "Because you really do look as if you needed a rest, and a cup of tea or something of that, I'm quite ashamed to have come bothering you so soon."
"Duty?" he questioned. "What duty?"
"Why," she exclaimed, "haven't you got a new place?"
"New place!" he repeated after. "What do you mean?"
"Why, as valet."
There was certainly danger in his tendency to forget that he was a valet. He collected himself.
"No," he said, "I haven't got a new place."
"Then why are you staying here?" she cried. "I thought you were simply here with a new master, Why are you staying here alone?"
"Oh," he replied, abashed, "it seemed a convenient place. It was just by chance that I came here."