"Is this inn very full?"
"Yes, very," said Spire. "The whole town is full of travellers and people from the country. A lot of our nobility and gentry are passing this way."
He deposited the shirts on a shelf in the depths of the wall and turned round again.
"Have you heard any names, Spire?"
Spire stooped over a trunk and lifted up from it carefully a lot of white neckcloths folded neatly one within the other.
"I haven't had much time yet, sir. I heard a few."
He laid down the neckcloths by the side of the shirts while Cosmo, with his elbow on the mantelpiece, asked down the whole length of the room:
"Anybody I know?"
"Not in this place, sir. There is generally a party of officers from the man-of-war staying here. They come and go. I have seen some Italian gentlemen in square-cut coats and powdered hair. Very old-fashioned, sir. There are some Austrians too, I think; but I haven't seen any ladies. . . . I am afraid, sir, this isn't the right sort of inn. There is another about a hundred yards from here on the other side of the square."
"I don't want to meet anybody I know," said Cosmo Latham in a low voice.