“I haven't any.”
She made an impatient gesture of dismay; the terrier rose and surveyed him with a low growl. “He promised me that he would do the thing properly, that I positively need not go. What experience have you had?”
He told her briefly.
“Dreadfully unsatisfactory,” she commented, “and you are oceans too young. But... we will try you for one week; I can't promise any more. Would you be willing to help a little in the house—opening boxes, unwrapping bones—?”
“Certainly,” he assured her cheerfully, “any little thing I can do....”
“The car's at the bottom of the garden, it has to be brought around by the side street. There's a room overhead, and a bell from the house. You must come up very quickly if, in the night, it rings three times, for that,” she informed him, “will mean burglars. My father and I are quite alone here with two women. I can't think of anything else now.” The terrier moved closer to Anthony, sniffing at his shoes, then raised his golden eyes and subjected him to a lengthy, thoughtful scrutiny. “That is Thomas Huxley,” she informed him; “he is a perfectly wonderful investigator, and detests all sentimentality. You will come up to the kitchen for meals,” she called, as Anthony turned to descend the lawn; “the bell will ring for your dinner.”
XXXIII
HE found the automobile in the semi-gloom of a closed carriage house. On the right, separated by a partition, were three loose stalls, apparently long unoccupied; their ornamental fringe of straw had moldered, and dank, grey heaps of feed lay in the troughs. A ladder fixed vertically against a wall disappeared into cobwebby shadows above; and mounting, Anthony found the room to which he had been directed. It, too, was partitioned from the great, bare space of the hay-loft; the musty smell of old hay and heated wood hung dusty, heavy, about the corners, where sounded the faint squeaks of scattering mice. The space which he was to occupy had been rigorously swept and aired; print curtains hung at the small dormer window that overlooked the lawn, while, above the washstand, was the bell which, he had been warned, would appraise him of the possible presence of burglars above. A bright metal clock ticked noisily on a deal bureau, and, on a table beside a pitcher and glass, two books had been arranged with precise disarray; they proved, upon investigation, to be a volume of the Edib. Rev. LXIX, and a bound collection of the proceedings of the Linean Society.