Lecount took them off for him.
"Thank you," he said, with the docility of a well-trained child. "It's
like a scene in a novel--it's like nothing in real life."
The bed-chamber was not very large, and the furniture was heavy and
old-fashioned. But evidences of Magdalen's natural taste and refinement
were visible everywhere, in the little embellishments that graced and
enlivened the aspect of the room. The perfume of dried rose-leaves
hung fra grant on the cool air. Mrs. Lecount sniffed the perfume with a
disparaging frown and threw the window up to its full height. "Pah!" she
said, with a shudder of virtuous disgust, "the atmosphere of deceit!"
She seated herself near the window. The wardrobe stood against the wall
opposite, and the bed was at the side of the room on her right hand.
"Open the wardrobe, Mr. Noel," she said. "I don't go near it. I touch
nothing in it myself. Take out the dresses with your own hand and put
them on the bed. Take them out one by one until I tell you to stop."
He obeyed her. "I'll do it as well as I can," he said. "My hands are
cold, and my head feels half asleep."
The dresses to be removed were not many, for Magdalen had taken some
of them away with her.
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