'
Her mother uttered a contemptuous sound. At the same time she moved
her head as if listening; some one was, in fact, descending the
stairs.
'Here he comes,' she whispered. 'Get the eggs ready, an' I'll make
the corffee.'
A tap at the door, then entered a tallish man of perhaps forty,
though he might be a year or two younger. His face was clean-shaven,
harsh-featured, unwholesome of complexion; its chief peculiarity was
the protuberance of the bone in front of each temple, which gave him
a curiously animal aspect. His lower lip hung and jutted forward;
when he smiled, as now in advancing to the fire, it slightly
overlapped the one above. His hair was very sparse; he looked,
indeed, like one who has received the tonsure. The movement of his
limbs betokened excessive indolence; he dragged his feet rather than
walked. His attire was equally suggestive; not only had it fallen
into the last degree of shabbiness (having originally been such as
is worn by a man above the mechanic ranks), but it was patched with
dirt of many kinds, and held together by a most inadequate supply of
buttons. At present he wore no collar, and his waistcoat, half-open,
exposed a red shirt.
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