Mrs. Derwall stiffened.
“Yes. She was here when you came.”
“Dear me! Why did you send her away? I really came out here, you know, to buy her house. I—I hear she wants to sell it. Would you advise me to look at it?”
Mrs. Derwall examined her cheque reflectively.
“Do you lecture as well as you shovel coal, Mr. Murch?”
“Goodness no!” he replied. “I worked my way around the world, once, as a stoker. But I make more money out of Browning. I fancy I make more than he did. Don’t you think, though, that I’d better take a look at your Mrs. Hopp? As you say, cheques are cheaper than houses.”
Mrs. Derwall re-examined her cheque.
“She isn’t there. You’re keeping her waiting in town while you snatch my house from over my head. She——”
A heavy tread sounded on the cellar stair. There descended into view a large and florid gentleman who gazed with some surprise, first at the well-dressed stranger who stood in front of his furnace, toying familiarly with his coal shovel, then at Mrs. Derwall, seated on her soap box as it were in her boudoir, conversing with the same.
Mrs. Derwall rose to the occasion.