The domineering man had come back into the room.
“Now, then, what’s your name?” he demanded brusquely.[Pg 448]
“Moss,” said Ross.
“Moss, eh? Very well! Ah, here’s Eddy! Eddy, take this young man over to the garage. See that he’s properly looked after. He’s our new chauffeur.”
V
The door closed behind them, and Ross round himself in the hall, alone with this Eddy. They stared at each other for a moment; then, in spite of himself, a grudging smile dawned upon Ross’s lean and dour face. Eddy grinned from ear to ear.
“Come on, shover!” he said. “I’ll show you your stall!”
A sheik, Eddy was; very slender, with black hair well oiled and combed back from his brow, and wearing clothes of the latest and jauntiest mode. But he lacked the lilylike languor of the true sheik; his rather handsome face was alert and cheerful; and although he moved with the somewhat supercilious grace of one who had been frequently called a just wonderful dancer, there was a certain wiry vigor about him.
Ross followed him down the hall and around the corner, into the corridor where Mrs. Jones’s room was. Ross saw that the door was a little ajar, and he dropped behind, because he wanted to look into that room, but Eddy, in passing, pulled it shut.
Did he know, too? Certainly he did not look like the sort of youth who went about closing doors unbidden, simply from a sense of order and decorum. And that grin—did it signify a shrewd understanding of a discreditable situation?