Mr. Gillat appeared quite overcome with joy and surprise, and it seemed to Julia, nervousness too.  He led her to a chair; “Won’t you sit down?” he said, placing it so that it commanded a view of the window and nothing else.

Julia sat down; she did not need to look at the room; she had already mastered most of its details.  When she first came in she had seen that it was small and poor—­a back bedroom, nothing more; an iron bed, not too tidy, stood in one corner, a washstand, with dirty water in the basin, in another.  There was a painted chest of drawers opposite the window; one leg was missing, its place being supplied by a pile of old school-books; the top was adorned with a piece of newspaper in lieu of a cover, and one of the drawers stood partly open; no human efforts could get it shut, so Mr. Gillat’s wardrobe was exposed to the public gaze—­if the public happened to look that way.  Julia did not; nor did she look towards the fire-place, where a very large towel-horse with a very small towel upon it acted as a stove ornament—­plain proof that fires were unknown there.  She looked across Mr. Gillat’s cheap lamp to the window and the vista of chimney pots, which were very well in view, for the blind refused to come down and only draped the upper half of the window in a drooping fashion.

Johnny stood against the chest of drawers, striving vainly to push the refractory drawer shut, although he knew by experience it was quite impossible.  She could see him without turning her head; he was shabbier than ever; even his tie—­his one extravagance used to be gay ties—­was shabby, and his shoes would hardly keep on his feet.  His round pink face was still round and pink; he did not look exactly older, though his grizzled little moustache was greyer, only somehow more puzzled and hurt by the ways of fate.  Julia knew that that was the way he would age; experience would never teach him anything, although, as she suddenly realised, it had been trying lately.

She turned away from the window; “I have left my luggage at the station,” she said; “I got out what I wanted in the waiting-room and brought it along in a parcel.  I think I’ll take it to my room now, if you don’t mind, and wash my face and get rid of my hat—­it is very heavy.  I shan’t be long.”

She rose as she spoke, and Johnny bustled to open the door for her, too much a gentleman, in spite of all, to show he was glad to have her go and give him a chance to clear up.  At the door she paused.

“You need not order supper, Johnny,” she said; “I’ve seen about that.”

Johnny stopped, his face a shade pinker.  “Oh, but,” he protested, “you shouldn’t do that; you mustn’t do that.  I’ll tell Mrs. Horn we won’t have it; I’ll make it all right with her; I was just going out to get a—­a pork pie for myself.”

It is to be feared this statement was no more veracious than Julia’s, and certainly it was not nearly so well made; it would not have deceived a far less astute person than she, while hers would have deceived a far more astute person than he.