"Ah, that's a brainy idea," remarked the youth, brightening. "I never thought of that."
Bindle opened the door and the youth entered.
There was a shrill scream from the pink négligé.
"It's all right, miss. This gentleman's like yerself, sort o' got hisself mixed up. There's a lady in 'is room—ahem! in 'is bed too. Kind o' family coach goin' on this mornin', seems to me."
The youth blushed rosily, and was just on the point of stammering apologies for his garb, when a tremendous uproar from the corridor interrupted him.
Bindle had purposely left the door ajar and through the slit he had, a moment previously, seen the clergyman disappear precipitately through one of the bedroom doors. It was from this room that the noise came.
"Mon Dieu!" shrieked a female voice. "Il se battent. À moi! à moi!" There were hoarse mutterings and the sound of blows.
"'Ere, you look arter each other," Bindle cried, "it's murder this time." And he sped down the corridor.
He entered No. 21 to find locked together in a deadly embrace the clergyman and a little bald-headed man in pyjamas. In the bed was a figure, Bindle mentally commended its daintiness, rising up from a foam of frillies and shrieking at the top of her voice "silly things wot wasn't even words," as Bindle afterwards told Mrs. Hearty.
"Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu! Il sera tué!"