“There’ll be what you want,” said the girl—“number six: but you won’t get in.”
“Why not?”
“Nobody does. She lives private and takes her beer on the chain.”
Her beer! Lady Skene’s mother! the parent of that cold and stately apparition—the stem from which that lovely rose had flowered!
Here was a startling beginning! But there was worse to come.
“Well,” I said stoutly, “there’ll be nothing lost by my trying, anyhow.”
The venture ran abroad somehow, for all the uninviting weather, and by the time I reached number six there were heads poking out of windows to canvas my repulse. I knocked at the door, and waited. After a quite reasonable interval a shuffling footstep sounded within, bolts were withdrawn, and the door opened a few inches, and grated on an iron tether.
“Who’s there?” said a querulous thin voice.
“I want to see Mother Carey,” I answered.
“She’s not in; she sees no one; she isn’t fit to be seen; go away!” said the voice, and the door came to sharply; but I had my foot ready.