She did not reply at once. After a moment she rose, then hesitated, resting a hand on the back of her chair. And her eyelids drooped until I could see the long, long lashes against her white skin.
“It was n't your fault,” she said, very low.
She moved toward her own room. I rose, and followed part way. “The morning will be a better time—to work,” I managed to say. “It will be quieter then.”
She hesitated in the doorway; then slowly inclined her head, as if in assent. It seemed to me that she was making an effort to smile.
“Good-night,” she murmured.
“Good-night,” said I.
She closed the door after her. But there remained a narrow opening where the upper part had shrunk away from the frame.
I stood confused, looking about my room. The table was still cluttered with our dinner things.
I got my long raincoat out of the wardrobe that serves me for a closet. I unscrewed a hook from the wardrobe and, climbing on a chair, screwed it into the woodwork directly above the edge of the door. Then I hung my raincoat from it. Thus I cosed that narrow opening between her room and mine.
When I went out for my walk, a little later, I came squarely on Sir Robert. He was standing at one end of the clerk's desk, peering through his monocle at the board on which were recorded the names and room numbers of the guests.