In the deepening dusk, Betty went out to find Eustace Lovegood.... She mounted the bare creaking stairs to his lodgings, and reaching his high attic, was glad to hear his deep-voiced growl to enter at her knocking.
The big man, in a threadbare dressing-gown, arose, with his wonted grand manner, to welcome her; and when he saw who was his visitor his heavy face was lighted with a smile:
“Mistress Betty!” said he—“by all that’s charming!”
He came to her and, the greetings over, with courtly etiquette led her to his chair—it was the only one in all the bare room.
“You look serious,” he said—“sit down and tell me.”
Betty hesitated:
“There is something on fire—a smell of paper burning,” she said.
Lovegood laughed his big laugh:
“I am making coffee,” he said.
She saw that the kettle in the narrow fireplace was being heated by burning balls of crumpled manuscript.