I followed Adèle upstairs rather wearily.
"I shall never get over this morning," I said. "Never." Arrived at our door, I fitted the key to the lock. "To think that I stood there and let you hand—— Oh, blast! We've left the scent in the car."
"So we have," said Adèle. "What an awful nuisance! I knew we should.
It's fatal to put anything in that hood. You don't see it."
I pushed open the door.
"As soon as I've changed," I said, switching on the light. "I'll go and——"
The sentence was never finished.
Had I been told that a cyclone had struck our bedroom, I should not have been surprised.
Adèle and I stood staring at such a state of disorder as I had never dreamed of.
The bed had been dragged from the wall, and its clothes distributed about the room; the wardrobe and cupboards stood open: every drawer in the room was on the floor: our clothing had been flung, like soiled linen, into corners: my wife's dressing-case had been forced, and now lay open, face downward, upon the carpet, while its contents sprawled upon a mattress: a chair had fallen backwards into the empty cabin-trunk, and the edge of a sheet had caught on one of its upturned legs….
"Adèle! Boy!" The swish of a skirt, and there was my sister behind us. "Our room's been—— Good Heavens, yours is the same! Whatever's the meaning of it?"