Sir Andrew knocked again, this time more
peremptorily: more oaths were heard, and then shuffling steps seemed
to draw near the door. Presently this was thrown open, and Marguerite
found herself on the threshold of the most dilapidated, most squalid
room she had ever seen in all her life.
The paper, such as it was, was hanging from the walls in
strips; there did not seem to be a single piece of furniture in the
room that could, by the wildest stretch of imagination, be called
"whole." Most of the chairs had broken backs, others had no seats to
them, one corner of the table was propped up with a bundle of faggots,
there where the fourth leg had been broken.
In one corner of the room there was a huge hearth, over which
hung a stock-pot, with a not altogether unpalatable odour of hot soup
emanating therefrom. On one side of the room, high up in the wall,
there was a species of loft, before which hung a tattered blue-and-white
checked curtain. A rickety set of steps led up to this loft.
On the great bare walls, with their colourless paper, all
stained with varied filth, there were chalked up at intervals in great
bold characters, the words: "Liberte--Egalite--Fraternite.
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