“Well, little one, I have looked at everything.”
“And you see nothing—nothing strange at all?”
“There’s a tabby cat two roofs off,” said the prosaic male doubtfully.
“No, no,” she interrupted impatiently, still without moving her eyes from his face. “Down below us—on the opposite side—a little to the left—in the black shade.” Her voice had sunk gradually into a whisper. Then she stopped.
“Well, I see nothing.”
“Not at the house where they have a floor shut up?”
George stepped forward and leaned over the rail of the balcony as she had done, Nouna following closely and clinging to his hand. On the opposite side, about three doors down, there was a flat on the third floor which had borne during the first days of their residence in Paris a large board inscribed ‘A louer.’ George saw that the board was gone, and that one of the shutters was thrown back.
“Oh, I see they’ve let it. Well, there’s nothing to be frightened about in that, my child.”
“You don’t notice anything else—anything strange—you don’t see any—person?”
George started, and looked down again with searching eagerness along the line of dead-eyed shuttered windows.