III
Some time after four o’clock my door was unlocked from without; the bolt slipped as noiselessly as it had been shot. I got a little sleep until seven, when the boys trotted into my room in their bathrobes and slippers and perched on my bed.
“It’s a nice day,” observed Harry, the elder. “Is that bump your feet?”
I wriggled my toes and assured him he had surmised correctly.
“You’re pretty long, aren’t you? Do you think we can play in the fountain to-day?”
“We’ll make a try for it, son. It will do us all good to get out into the sunshine.”
“We always took Chang for a walk every day, Mademoiselle and Chang and Freddie and I.”
Freddie had found my cap on the dressing table and had put it on his yellow head. But now, on hearing the beloved name of his pet, he burst into loud grief-stricken howls.
“Want Mam’selle,” he cried. “Want Chang too. Poor Freddie!”
The children were adorable. I bathed and dressed them and, mindful of my predecessor’s story of crackers and milk, prepared for an excursion kitchenward. The nights might be full of mystery, murder might romp from room to room, but I intended to see that the youngsters breakfasted. But before I was ready to go down breakfast arrived.