Shall I take it down for you ?" More urbanity on my part.

She found pencil and paper on an escritoire near by, and went back to the instrument.

For a while she listened and wrote.

At last she said: "Are you sure there's no signature ?" She got the reply, waited until the message had been read over, and hung up the receiver.

When she came round to me--my back had been half turned to her all the time--I was astonished to see her looking rather shaken.