So we went on, past Variable Winds, on down to the Island of Whistling Reeds.
A quiet, rather grim-faced man helped us to make our landing and we went up to the house.
Before we reached it, March paused to give it a moment’s study.
We looked at its pleasant porches and its windows with light, fluttering curtains. From one window, on the second floor, a face looked out at us, a girl’s face, with dark, bobbed hair.
The head was quickly withdrawn, and we went up the steps and March rang the bell.
In a moment the door was opened by the girl whose face we had seen at the window. She now wore a bit of a frilled cap with a black velvet bow.
This she had obviously donned at the sound of the doorbell.
“We have come,” March said to her, in his pleasant way, “to look over the house.”
“It isn’t for sale,” she said, not frightened at all, but seeming a little amused.
“I know. I don’t want to buy or rent it. Are you the parlour maid?”