“Here, now!” he said. “You—Moss—Moss, that’s it. Moss, just lend a hand with this bag. That’s right; up the stairs—first door on the left. That’s it! That’s it! There you are, Gayle, my boy!”
He turned to Ross.
“Moss,” he said. “Everything going along all right? That’s it! That’s it! You let me know if there’s anything wrong.”
Ross was hard put to it to suppress a smile. He imagined how it would be if he should say:
“Well, sir, there was one little thing—a dead man under the housekeeper’s sofa. But, perhaps I shouldn’t mention it.”
He looked for a moment into the bluff, scowling, kindly face of the man Eddy had called “a prince.”
“Thank you, sir,” he said, and turned away, down the hall toward the back stairs. And, as he came round the corner into the corridor, where the housekeeper’s room was, his quick ear caught some words of such remarkable personal interest to him that he stood still.
“Another James Ross!” Mrs. Jones was saying. “That’s a likely story, I must say! Amy, that man’s a fraud and a spy!”
“No, Nanna darling, he’s not!” answered Amy, with sweet obstinacy.
“I tell you he is, child. He’s got to go.”