"What a night!"
"Yes, it is," said Tom. "You'd better get home."
His eyes growing accustomed to the gloom, he saw the pair distinctly. The old man was wearing a high hat, battered and set rakishly on the side of his head. The collar of a threadbare overcoat was turned up high over his skinny neck. He wore shabby black gloves. The old lady, sheltering behind the old man, was less easily discerned. She was a humped and disconcerted shadow, with a feather in her hat and a sharp nose.
"You'd better be getting home," Tom repeated, wondering to himself that he stayed.
The old man peered up at him.
"You're out for no good, I reckon," he mumbled. "Waiting like this on a night like this." There was a note in his voice of scornful patronage.
"I'm not out for anything particular," said Tom. "Simply taking a walk." The old lady sneezed again. "You'd really better be going home. Your wife's got a terrible cold."
"She's not my wife," said the old man. "She's my sister, if you want to know."
"I don't want to know especially," said Tom. "Well, good-night: I see the rain's dropped."
He stepped out into Bond Street, and then (on looking back he could never define precisely the impulse that drove him) he hurried back to them.