“Remnants.”
“At all events the sofa—”
She raised its drapery, and I saw that the sofa was built of packing cases.
“The desk—”
I really thought that I was safe this time, for could I not see the drawers with their brass handles, the charming shelf for books, the pigeon-holes with their coverings of silk?
“She made it out of three orange boxes,” said the lady, at last a little awed herself.
I looked around me despairingly, and my eye alighted on the holland covering. “There is a fine chandelier in that holland bag,” I said coaxingly.
She sniffed and was raising an untender hand, when I checked her. “Forbear, ma'am,” I cried with authority, “I prefer to believe in that bag. How much to be pitied, ma'am, are those who have lost faith in everything.” I think all the pretty things that the little nursery governess had made out of nothing squeezed my hand for letting the chandelier off.
“But, good God, ma'am,” said I to madam, “what an exposure.”
She intimated that there were other exposures upstairs.