“Nice room,” said Mrs. Anders. “Top floor. Seven dollars. I show you.”
“Seven?” said he. “Well, I’ll take a look.”
Mrs. Anders had already begun to mount the stairs, and he followed her. On the top floor she opened a door and showed him a bare little room, very clean.
“Seven dollars?” he repeated.
Mrs. Anders was terribly anxious to let the room, because Oscar said it was her fault that nobody had taken it yet. Perhaps seven dollars was too much for it. She knew nothing about such matters; only she did so want to let it.
“Ver-ry goot room!” she said, and looked about for advantages to praise. “Heatness!” she said, touching her worn shoe against the register, from which came a tepid current of air. “Vater!” And she turned on the tap in the wash basin.
Still the young man did not seem impressed.
“Well, see here,” he said. “What about—”
The rest of his question Mrs. Anders could not understand.
“Excoos?” she said, straining every nerve to catch his meaning. She saw that he was growing impatient. A formidable young man he was, big and blond, with eyes like blue ice, and a dogged jaw.