opened instantly,
as if by magic. Mr Simon Loggerheads said to himself, as he saw the door
move on its hinges, that Miss Morfe must have discovered a treasure of a
servant who, when she had nothing else to do, spent her time on the
inner door-mat waiting to admit possible visitors--even on Friday night.
Nevertheless, Mr Simon Loggerheads regretted that prompt opening, as one
regrets the prompt opening of the door of a dentist.

And it was no servant who stood in front of him, under the flickering
beam of the lobby-lamp. It was Mary Morfe herself. The simple
explanation was that she had just sped her brother and Eva Harracles,
and had remained in the lobby for the purpose of ascertaining by means
of her finger whether the servant had, as usual, forgotten to dust the
tops of the picture-frames.

"Oh!" said Mr Loggerheads, when he saw Mary Morfe. For the cashier of
the Bursley branch of the Birmingham and Sheffield Bank it was not a
very able speech, but it was all he could accomplish.

And Miss Mary Morfe said:

"Oh!"

She was thirty-eight, and he was quite that (for the Bank mentioned
does not elevate its men to the august situation of cashier under less
than twenty years' service), and yet they neither of them had enough
worldliness to behave in a reasonable manner. Then Miss Morfe, to whom
it did at last occur that something must be done, produced an
invitation:

"Do come in!" And she added, "Richard has just gone out."

"Oh!" commented Mr Simon Loggerheads again. (After all, it must be
admitted that tenors as a class have never been noted for their
conversational powers.) But he was obviously more at ease, and he went
in, and Mary Morfe shut the door. At this very instant her brother and
Eva were in secret converse at the back end of Beech Street.

"Do take your coat off!" Mary suggested to Simon. Simultaneously the
servant appeared at the kitchen extremity of the lobby, and Mary thrust
her out of sight again with the cold words: "It's all right, Susan."

Mr Loggerheads took his coat off, and Mary Morfe watched him as he did
so.

He made a pretty figure. He was something of a dandy. The lapels of the
overcoat would have showed that, not to mention the correctly severe
necktie. All his clothes, in fact, had "cut and style," even to his
boots. In the Five Towns many a young man is a dandy down to the edge of
his trousers, but not down to the ground. Mr Loggerheads looked a young
man. The tranquillity of hi