His murmur stopped. He was not going to tell me what this
something was. And I didn't care. Anxious to carry the news to my
charterers, I ran back on the verandah to get my hat.

At the bustle I made the girl turned her eyes slowly in my
direction, and even the old woman was checked in her knitting. I
stopped a moment to exclaim excitedly:

"Your father's a brick, Miss Don't Care. That's what he is."

She beheld my elation in scornful surprise. Jacobus with unwonted
familiarity seized my arm as I flew through the dining-room, and
breathed heavily at me a proposal about "A plate of soup" that
evening. I answered distractedly: "Eh? What? Oh, thanks!
Certainly. With pleasure," and tore myself away. Dine with him?
Of course. The merest gratitude

But some three hours afterwards, in the dusky, silent street, paved
with cobble-stones, I became aware that it was not mere gratitude
which was guiding my steps towards the house with the old garden,
where for years no guest other than myself had ever dined. Mere
gratitude does not gnaw at one's interior economy in that
particular way. Hunger might; but I was not feeling particularly
hungry for Jacobus's food.

On that occasion, too, the girl refused to come to the table.

My exasperation grew. The old woman cast malicious glances at me.
I said suddenly to Jacobus: "Here! Put some chicken and salad on