Miss Ling was hoping that Mr. Breagh had passed a comfortable night?
"First rate, ma'am, many thanks to you!" returned the object of her solicitude.
"For," said Miss Ling, with a homely kind of dignity, "if anything was wanting, Mr. Breagh must make excuses. The arrival being unlooked-for and the notice very short."
"Dropped on you out of the skies, didn't he, Maria?" chuckled Mr. Knewbit. "And you've put him, for the present, in Mr. Ticking's bed!"
"In Mr. Ticking's bed!—Mr. Ticking," explained Miss Ling, turning to the new arrival, "who rents our third-floor front, being in the country for his holidays."
P. C. Breagh expressed the hope that Mr. Ticking would not be offended.
"Lord bless you, no!" responded Mr. Knewbit. "Ticking's an agreeable feller. He'd take you rather as a Boon than otherwise. Contributes a column of cheerful, gossipy items weekly to half-a-dozen of the suburban and district newspapers that are springing up around us like—like mushrooms. Always on the look-out for copy—Ticking is! Now Mounteney——"
"Mr. Mounteney—who is also away on his vacation, and rents the front sitting-room on our ground-floor, and the bedroom behind it," said Miss Ling, "is a gentleman who—owing to the nature of his professional employment—is very refined and sensitive."
"Edits the Health and Beauty column of the Ladies' Mentor," said Mr. Knewbit, crunching fried bread noisily, "and is altogether too ladylike a gentleman to take a liberty with. For the rest, we are Full Up. To begin with, I occupy a combined bed-and-sitting room behind this kitchen, and Miss Ling occupies the large front garret bedroom; the back one being partitioned off as a Box and Lumber room, and a bedroom for the servant gal, who is now having her breakfast in the scullery, as me and Miss Ling agreed would be more considerate toward you.... Coming down again to the first-floor, the front parlor and back bedroom are rented by a German gentleman, Mr. Van Something——"
"Herr von Rosius," interpolated Miss Ling, "who is a teacher at the Institute of Languages in Berners Street.... Second-floor front, another combined bed-and-sitting ... Monsieur Meguet, a French gentleman who is studying Prints at the British Museum. Second-floor back, Miss Kindell, who is a copier of Pictures at the National Gallery, and a sweet artist. Third-floor, Mr. Ticking——"