At once Maggie noticed his smile. He was dressed very smartly
in a black coat and waist-coat and pepper-and-salt trousers. His
bowler was cocked a little to one side. She passed them and the
little round man, looking her full in the face, smiled so happily
and with so radiant an amiability that she was compelled to respond.
The woman did not look at her.
Long after she had left them she thought of the little man's smile.
There was something that, in spite of herself, reminded her both of
Uncle Mathew and Martin. She felt a sudden and warm kinship,
something that she had not known since her arrival in Skeaton. Had
she not struggled with herself every kind of reminiscence of her
London life would have come crowding about her. This meeting was
like the first little warning tap upon the wall . . .
On her return she spoke of it.
"Oh," said Paul, "that must have been poor little Mr. Toms with his
sister."
"Poor?" asked Maggie.
"Yes. He's queer in his head, you know," said Paul. "Quite harmless,
but he has the strangest ideas."
Maggie noticed then that Grace shivered and the whole of her face
worked with an odd emotion of horror and disgust.
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