He stood a little aside, waving us politely into the hall behind him.
"Dr. Lorrimore would be very angry with me if I allowed a lady and gentleman to stand in his door and did not invite them into his house," he said, in the same even, mellifluous tones. "Please to enter."
"Oh, is this Dr. Lorrimore's?" I said. "Thank you—we'll come in. Is Dr. Lorrimore at home?"
"Presently," he answered. "He is in the village."
He closed the door as we entered, passed us with a bow, preceded us along the hall, and threw open the door of a room which looked out on a trim garden at the rear of the house. Still smiling and bland he invited us to be seated, and then, with another bow, left the room, apparently walking on velvet. Miss Raven and I glanced at each other.
"So Dr. Lorrimore has a Chinese man servant?" she said. "How—picturesque!"
"Um!" I muttered.
She gave me a questioning, half-amused glance, and dropped her voice.
"Don't you like—Easterns?" she whispered.
"I like 'em in the East," I replied. "In Northumberland they don't—shall we say they don't fit in with the landscape."