left.  It happened that she knew nothing against him.  But she did not require evidence.  She simply did “not like that man”—­(she italicized the end of the phrase bitingly to herself)—­and there was no appeal against the verdict.  Angels could not have successfully interceded for him in the courts of her mind.  He never guessed, in his aged self-sufficiency, that his case was hopeless with Rachel, nor even that the child had dared to have any opinion about him at all.

She was about to slip off the pinafore-apron and drop it on to the oak chest that stood in the lobby.  But she thought with defiance:  “Why should I take my pinafore off for him?  I won’t.  He shan’t see my nice frock.  Let him see my pinafore.  I am an independent woman, earning my own living, and why should I be ashamed of my pinafore?  My pinafore is good enough for him!” She also thought:  “Let him wait!” and went off into the kitchen to get the modern appliance of the match for lighting the gas in the lobby.  When she had lighted the gas she opened the front door with audacious but nervous deliberation, and the famous character impatiently walked straight in.  He wore prominent loose black kid gloves and a thin black overcoat.

Looking coolly at her, he said—­

“So you’re the new lady companion, young miss!  Well, I’ve heard rare accounts on ye—­rare accounts on ye!  Missis is in, I reckon?”

His voice was extremely low, rich, and heavy.  It descended on the silence like a thick lubricating oil that only reluctantly abandons the curves in which it falls.

And Rachel answered, faintly, tremulously—­“Yes.”

No longer was she the independent woman, censorious and scornful, but a silly, timid little thing.  Though she condemned herself savagely for school-girlishness, she could do nothing to arrest the swift change in her.  The fact was, she was abashed, partly by the legendary importance of the renowned Batchgrew, but more by his physical presence.  His mere presence was always disturbing; for when he supervened into an environment he had always the air of an animal on a voyage of profitable discovery.  His nose was an adventurous, sniffing nose, a true nose, which exercised the original and proper functions of a nose noisily.  His limbs were restless, his boots like hoofs.  His eyes were as restless as his limbs, and seemed ever to be seeking for something upon which they could definitely alight, and not finding it.  He performed eructations with the disarming naturalness of a baby.  He was tall but not stout, and yet he filled the lobby; he was the sole fact in the lobby, and it was as though Rachel had to crush herself against the wall in order to make room for him.