"Yes, sir—my lord," responded Miss Popkiss, abandoning the discussion of the parental characteristics in favour of a subject of more immediate interest, namely, herself; "it is a bit dullish here. That's why I am leaving."
"Oh, you are leaving?" remarked Peckover, taking as polite an interest in the statement as was consistent with having his mouth full.
"Yes," she informed him. "I am going to the place you are bound for."
The bubbling glass was half-way to his eager lips, but he set it down again. "The devil you are?" he exclaimed.
"It must at least be as lively as this," Miss Popkiss hazarded, with a pretty affectation of ennui.
"A good deal more so," the guest declared, pausing in his eating to stare blankly in front of him in utter mystification. The result of his hazy cogitation was that if the people of the inn were labouring under some absurd delusion it would be as well not to disturb it. "Well, there's no accounting for tastes," he remarked, falling back on that non-committal, if unoriginal aphorism, and redirecting his attention to the roast chicken.
"Some folks," gossiped Miss Popkiss, by way of a running conversational accompaniment to the dinner, "who don't fancy the place, would say it was out of the frying pan into the fire."
Number twenty-four had steadied the guest's nerves. "Yes," he agreed grimly, "most people would say that. Now," he muttered, "she's at it. What's that?" he inquired, pointing with his knife to a side dish.
"Curry, sir—my lord," the waitress answered, moving the dish towards him. "Curried goose, my lord."
He gave her a suspicious glance, and then pushed the dish away. There seemed too much of the personal and anticipatory element in the pungent dainty.