have acquired a habit of stopping there; the one on the left had a more
stable tenant; a lady who appeared in the pantomime, or the opera, he
wasn't sure which,--only, foreign people sometimes went in and out.

John Steele rose with an effort; no, there was nothing more he required,
except rest! Which room would he prefer, he was asked when he found
himself on the upper landing; the man had put his things in a front
chamber; but the back one was larger. John Steele forced himself to
consider; he even inspected both of the rooms; that on the front floor
had one window facing the Row; the second chamber looked out over a rear
wall separating the vegetable garden of Rosemary Villa from the
shrub-adorned confines of a place which fronted on the next street.

The visitor decided on the former chamber; he carefully closed the
blinds and drew across the window the dark, heavy curtains. This would
answer very well; excellent accommodations for a man whose own chambers
in the city were now in the hands of renovators--the painters, the
paper-hangers, the plumbers. And the back room? He paused, as if
considering the servant's assumption of his purpose in coming hither. He
might as well let the fellow think--

Yes, he would venture to make use of that for his work; could thus take
advantage of the force of circumstances that had arisen to alienate him
from prosaic citations, writs or arraignments. But he must, with
strained lightness, emphasize one point; for a brief spell he did not
wish to be disturbed. People might call; people probably would, anxious
clients, almost impossible to get rid of, unless--

No one must know where he was, under any circumstances; his voice
sounded almost jocular, at singular variance with the heaviness, the