His face was large, ugly,
and forbidding; his gray hair and beard were cropped close, his eyebrows
met at the bridge of his nose and overhung his large eyes like a screen.
His lips were very wide, and, being turned downward at the corners, they
gave him a dolorous expression. His lower jaw was square and protruding,
and a pair of prodigious white ears projected from beneath his
sugar-loaf cap. He seemed to take his cue from the old man, for he
repeated his sentiment.
"Yes," said he, with a voice which broke alternately into a roar and a
whisper, "that was a good story."
"Y-yes," faltered Miss Eunice, "and it has the merit of being t-rue."
He replied with a nod, and looked absently over her head while he rubbed
the nap upon his chin with his hand. Miss Eunice discovered that his
knee touched the skirt of her dress, and she was about to move in order
to destroy this contact, when she remembered that Miss Crofutt would
probably have cherished the accident as a promoter of a valuable
personal influence, so she allowed it to remain. The lean-faced man was
not to be mentioned in the same breath with this one, therefore she
adopted the superior villain out of hand.
She began to approach him. She asked him where he lived, meaning to
discover whence he had come. He replied in the same mixture of roar and
whisper, "Six undered un one, North Wing.
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