“No trouble, sir,” was the civil reply.
Mrs. Morton held the door, wondering why the visitor still remained, now that his errand was accomplished. The lawyer’s purpose, however, still remained to be effected. He was even now cudgelling his brains to devise a method of reaching it.
“A moment more,” he said, with suavity. “I think, as I passed last evening, that I saw a little girl enter with an elderly gentleman.”
“Helen Ford?”
“Oh, yes. She boards with you, does she not?”
“Helen and her father have a room up stairs. They board themselves. I only lodge them.”
“Pardon my curiosity, but I have an object in view. What is her father’s occupation?”
“He is busy about some invention, and has been ever since he came here. A flying machine, I believe.”
“Ah, yes,” said the lawyer, to whom this was all new. “It is as I supposed. Can I see them? I picked up a small purse,” he added, by way of explanation, “just after they passed me in the street, and I thought it not unlikely that the young lady might have dropped it.”
“Certainly,” said the landlady, somewhat more favorably disposed to Mr. Sharp, in consequence of this evidence of his integrity. “Their room is on the fourth floor, at the head of the stairs. Perhaps I had better go up and show you.”