“Has he gone?” inquired the porter.
“He? Whom do you mean?” asked Silas, somewhat sharply, for he was irritated by his disappointment.
“I did not notice him go out,” continued the porter, “but I trust you paid him. We do not care, in this house, to have lodgers who cannot meet their liabilities.”
“What the devil do you mean?” demanded Silas rudely. “I cannot understand a word of this farrago.”
“The short blond young man who came for his debt,” returned the other. “Him it is I mean. Who else should it be, when I had your orders to admit no one else?”
“Why, good God, of course he never came,” retorted Silas.
“I believe what I believe,” returned the porter, putting his tongue into his cheek with a most roguish air.
“You are an insolent scoundrel,” cried Silas, and, feeling that he had made a ridiculous exhibition of asperity, and at the same time bewildered by a dozen alarms, he turned and began to run upstairs.
“Do you not want a light then?” cried the porter.
But Silas only hurried the faster, and did not pause until he had reached the seventh landing and stood in front of his own door. There he waited a moment to recover his breath, assailed by the worst forebodings and almost dreading to enter the room.