"Oh, I don't know. A little man round the corner."
"I wonder who it was. Was it a little cobbler with red hair? That would be Simone. Did you notice if he had red hair?"
"I don't know," said Norman, inwardly consigning the old girl to perdition. "He wore a felt hat."
"Ah, Simone has no hat," said the Widow Prasko. "And have you any luggage?"
"It is coming on by train."
"Did you not come by train yourself?"
"No," said Norman, crossly. "I have walked all night, from Braxea, and I am very tired. Please give me a room or refuse a room and send me away, at once."
"Ah, forgive me," said the widow, quite courteously, "but I have a daughter in the house, and I must ask questions. And, of course, you must be either very mad or very poor or you would not have walked from Braxea, and if you had walked you would have gone to the hotel."
"Do I look like the sort of man who would misbehave with your daughter?" said Norman, stiffly.
"Oh, I don't mind how you behave with per. But you might want to marry her, and I should not like her to marry a poor man."