"This is the apartment, m'm," said the landlady, opening the first of
the rusty-coloured doors. The room, which had a paper of blue roses on a
yellow ground, was separated from another room by double doors.
"I let the rooms together sometimes, but just now that room's taken--a
young gentleman in the City; that's why I'm able to let this cheap."
Cecilia looked at Hilary. "I hardly think---"
The landlady quickly turned the handles of the doors, showing that they
would not open.
"I keep the key," she said. "There's a bolt on both sides."
Reassured, Cecilia walked round the room as far as this was possible,
for it was practically all furniture. There was the same little wrinkle
across her nose as across Thyme's nose when she spoke of Hound Street.
Suddenly she caught sight of Hilary. He was standing with his back
against the door. On his face was a strange and bitter look, such as a
man might have on seeing the face of Ugliness herself, feeling that she
was not only without him, but within--a universal spirit; the look of a
man who had thought that he was chivalrous, and found that he was
not; of a leader about to give an order that he would not himself have
executed.
Seeing that look, Cecilia said with some haste:
"It's all very nice and clean; it will do very well, I think.
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