And conning Barbier's directions in his mind, he turned into the gateway, and made boldly for a curtained door behind which shone a light.
The woman, who came out in answer to his knock, looked him all over from head to foot, while he explained himself in his best French.
'Tiens,' she said, indifferently, to a man behind her, 'it's the people for No. 26—des Anglais—M. Paul te l'a dit. Hand me the key.'
The bonhomme addressed—a little, stooping, wizened creature, with china-blue eyes, showing widely in his withered face under the light of the paraffin-lamp his wife was holding—reached a key from a board on the wall and gave it to her.
The woman again surveyed them both, the young man and the girl, and seemed to debate with herself whether she should take the trouble to be civil. Finally she said in an ungracious voice—
'It's the fourth floor to the right. I must take you up, I suppose.'
David thanked her, and she preceded them with the light through a door opposite and up some stone stairs.
When they had mounted two flights, she turned abruptly on the landing—
'You take the appartement from M. Dubois?'
'Yes,' said David, enchanted to find that, thanks to old Barbier's constant lessons, he could both understand and reply with tolerable ease; 'for a fortnight.'