I did not pay much attention to these things; and it was not until Elizabeth had been with me for some time that I discovered her intense fatalism.  She ordered her life by Signs, in fact.  You or I might drop a tablespoon on the floor and think nothing of it, but she would tell you at once it was a Sign that a tall dark lady was coming to the house.  If a knife fell you would hear her mutter ‘That’s a man.’  According to Elizabeth, success in life is in no wise due to personal effort—­it all depends on whether you are ‘born lucky.’

Unfortunately Elizabeth was ’born unlucky’—­unfortunately for me as well as her.  Destiny, having now woven my life with hers, it made me unlucky, too.  For example, she would come to me and announce, ’I’ve been unlucky an’ broke the teapot this mornin’.  That means I’ll break another two things afore the week’s out.  It always goes in threes.’

‘Then hadn’t you better smash something that is of no value at once,’ was my obvious suggestion, ‘and get it over?’

But Elizabeth, entrenched in her convictions, would shake her head.  ‘That’s no good.  I’ve tried that afore an’ it didn’t work.  You see, it ‘as to be done unexpected to break the spell.’  So the spell had to be broken also.  Clearly, human intervention was no good at all.  Fate was against both of us.

There is something positively uncanny in the way misfortune lies in wait for that girl.  You would think that after causing her to break two full breakfast services it would leave her alone for a while.  But no; she was half-way through the third before her luck showed any signs of changing.

Spilling the salt accounted for three burnt saucepans and the collapse of the plate rack (at the moment fully charged); while seeing the new moon through glass caused her to overlook the fact that she had left a can in the middle of the staircase.  Afterwards (during the week that I waited on her on account of her sprained ankle) she said she would never go near a window again until the moon was at full and quite safe.

Of course, I do my best to parry these mysterious blows of Fate.  I remember when she first undertook to clean the drawing-room I took away everything that a mysterious agency might cause to ‘come in two’ in her hands.  I left her alone with the grand piano and scrubbing materials, and went out to spend the afternoon with cheerful countenance.  I returned rather late, and directly Elizabeth opened the door to me I saw that something was wrong.

‘I’ve been unlucky,’ she began.

‘Unlucky!’ I faltered.  ’But what with?  Don’t say the piano came in two in your hands?’

’It wasn’t my ‘ands, it was my feet.  The floor gave way an’ I went through.’

‘You went through the floor!’ I marvelled.  Then my face cleared.  The house was not mine, and, after all, the landlord has no right to escape these unusual machinations of Fate.