person and work. Please, please, don't go. Do you know, I live in
constant dread of being left alone with a clever person."

"I must apologise for my intrusion, in that case," said Miss Ford, with
dignity. "I repeat, I only came because I saw yours was an exceptional
case."

There was a very long silence in the growing dusk. The moon could
already be seen through the glass door, rising, pushing vigorously aside
the thickets of the crowded sky. A crack across the corner of the glass
was lighted up, and looked like a little sprig of lightning, plucked
from a passing storm and preserved in the glass.

Miss Ford suddenly began to talk in a very quick and confused way. Any
sane hearer would have known that she was talking by mistake, that she
was possessed by some distressingly Anti-Ford spirit, and that nothing
she might say in parenthesis like this ought to be remembered against
her.

"Oh, God," said Miss Ford, "I have come because I am hungry, hungry for
what you spoke of last night, in the dark.... You spoke of an April
sea--clashing of cymbals was the expression you used, wasn't it? You
spoke of a shore of brown diamonds flat to the ruffled sea ... and
white sandhills under a thin veil of grass ... and tamarisks all blown
one way...."

"Well?" said the witch.

"Well," faltered Miss Ford. "I think I came to ask you ... whether you
knew of nice lodgings there ... plain wholesome bath ... respectable