Free Old Sinners Never Die by Dorothy Salisbury Davis

Tom in a hoarse whisper. “He won’t take it from her. No wonder the women are stepping on us every chance they get. Whisst! Here he comes.”
    Mrs. Norris gave Tom a poke and pointed to the open window nearby. The Frenchman’s voice came out to them clearly, but alas, he was speaking in a foreign language, presumably French.
    “What’s he saying?” said Tom into her ear.
    “I think he’s crying,” said Mrs. Norris, for the tone much suggested it. She also caught the word “petit”. The man then lit the lamp and began to gather papers out of a desk. Mrs. Norris took a chance with the possibilities. “I think he’s getting ready to leave, and he doesn’t want to go at all.”
    Tom nodded, his mouth a bit open, she presumed in admiration of her knowledge of French.
    The woman came into the room without the baby, and the man took her into his arms. She was an ample body, Mrs. Norris thought, overflowing him by a few pounds. Between the tears and the gestures, and the foreign language, the scene bore a remarkable resemblance to grand opera.
    “I’ll go up and pack your suitcase,” the woman said then in a native American voice.
    “Do not wake the children,” he cried after her dramatically. “I could not bear any more adieus tonight.”
    Tom and Mrs. Norris nodded at one another, having heard the confirmation. In the house, the instant the woman had gone upstairs, the Frenchman came to the windows and drew the shades, a great precision about his movements. A few seconds later—before the watchers had decided on their next move—he came out into the vestibule in his shirtsleeves and, most curiously, worked at the mailbox. He seemed to be removing or changing the nameplate.
    As soon as he returned to the living room, Tom skipped lightly into the vestibule, glanced at the boxes on both sides and came out, all in a few seconds.
    “He’s taken the nameplate off,” he whispered. He caught Mrs. Norris’ arm and led her a distance from the house. “The name of the people on the other side is Walker, by the way. You know—the whisky?
    “I thought you didn’t drink,” Mrs. Norris said.
    “There’s no harm, is there, in knowing what I’m missing?” Tom snapped. “I want to go round now and see if he has a car in a garage. I’ll be back in a minute. Keep watch.”
    Mrs. Norris had never in her life minded the darkness, and she had certainly long since become used to no company but her own. But it was a curious thing she was doing just now, standing on one foot and then the other, spying on an utter stranger in Washington, D.C., and with no other justification than the say-so of a wild young Irishman with the Gaelic imagination. The more she thought about it—and it was a long, long minute he was gone—the madder she thought the whole business. Nonetheless, she made a note of her surroundings, the number of the house, and then the hour of the night. It was 12.40.
    Within the house a child started to cry, and then, if she was not mistaken, another. It sounded like a whole parcel of them. And still Tom did not return. The front door of the house opened and the Frenchman came out, dressed now in a business suit, and walked briskly across the veranda to within a foot or two of the very spot Tom and Mrs. Norris had been standing a few minutes before. Without wasting a motion, he removed the round head from one of the balusters in the veranda rail, put his hand into the hollow and drew out a small, oblong parcel. He replaced the head, and then, about to go indoors again, paused and closed the window, cutting off the sound of the squalling from within.
    Mrs. Norris knew then that Tom, whether in spite or because of himself, was onto something. The Frenchman hurried indoors. From down the street, someone was whistling. She listened a second: Annie Laurie . She went to the sidewalk and looked. Tom was leaning against a lamp post. He straightened up when she came into sight, gave a little jerk of his head and