I secured a strong grip on the bottom of the thing and heaved manfully.
"You might let me help," she cried, firmly grasping a side piece with both hands.
The bed moved. The veins stood out on my neck and temples. My face must have been quite purple, and it is a hue that I detest. When I was a very small laddie my mother put me forward to be admired in purple velveteen. The horror of it still lingers.
By means of great straining I got the heavy bed over against the mirror, upsetting the tin bathtub with a crash that under ordinary circumstances would have made my heart stand still but now only tripled its pumping activities. One of the legs was hopelessly splintered in the drop from the raised platform.
"There," she said, standing off to survey our joint achievement, "we've stopped it up very nicely." She brushed the tips of her fingers daintily. "This afternoon you may fetch up a hammer and some nails and fasten the mirror permanently. Then you can move the bed back to its proper place. Goodness! What a narrow squeak!"
"Madam," said I, my hand on my heart but not through gallantry, "that bed stays where it is. Not all the king's horses nor all the king's men can put it back again."
"Was it so heavy, Mr. Smart?"
I swallowed very hard. A prophetic crick already had planted itself in my back. "Will you forgive me if I submit that you sleep quite a distance from home?" I remarked with justifiable irony. "Why the deuce don't you stay on the upper floors?"
"Because I am mortally afraid," she said, with a little shudder. "You've no idea how lonely, how spooky it is up there at the dead hour of night. I couldn't sleep. After the third night I had my things moved down here, where I could at least feel that there were strong men within—you might say arm's length of me. I'm—I'm shockingly timid."
She smiled; a wavering, pleading little smile that conquered.