THE GIRL IN HIS HOUSE
"Did you ever know that floors talk in the night?" she asked. She possessed the queerest fancies.
"What do they say?" He glanced anxiously at the clock.
"There's a board over there, just this side of the curtains, that is always yawning and saying, 'Oh, dear!' There's another in the middle hall that says, 'Look sharp!' And I always walk around it. There's the funniest old grumbler in my room. I can't get it to say anything; it just mumbles and grumbles. The one in your room says, 'Lonesome! Lonesome!' And the store-room has one that says, 'Hark!' so sharply that I always stop and listen. I suppose it's because I'm not used to wooden floors."
"And because I don't believe you're a real human being at all, only just a fairy."
"Well, perhaps." She rose and faced him suddenly. "Am I different? I mean, am I different from your friends? Do I do things I oughtn't? Why did you want to go back?"
"I didn't. I only felt I ought to."
She wrinkled her forehead, trying to decipher this. "I speak English like anybody
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