"I PUT ON MY MOST PATHETIC EXPRESSION, AND ENTERED."
"Quite audible," I answered, catching eagerly at the chance of explanation. "In fact it was too audible—that was just it. It's rather disturbing in my flat."
"And may I ask why I am not to play the piano?" she replied. "There was a noise in your flat the night before last considerably less melodious than a piano."
"I suppose there was. Ellis and some other men came to a farewell dinner with me before his departure to India. It shan't occur again," I said; "and you see, I'm reading for my final, and if you could——"
She looked at me somewhat doubtfully.
"The Solicitor's final," I added—it was a fragment of my intended appeal to the elderly spinster—"is a very difficult examination, and requires concentrated attention."
"You're reading for the Solicitor's final?" she exclaimed, with a sudden change of expression. "Oh, then you must know a lot of law."
"That scarcely follows," I began to protest, in some surprise.
"And you can explain to me what a negotiable instrument really is," she went on, delightedly.
I began to think she must be mad.