Hilary Vance welcomed them with the most cordial exuberance, led the way to his spare bedroom, and with an entire unconsciousness of that bedroom's amazing resemblance to a long-forgotten dust-bin, invited Pollyooly to unpack the box and make herself at home.
Pollyooly gazed slowly round the room, and then she looked at her host in some discomfort.

She was a well-mannered child, and careful of the feelings of a host.

Then she said in a hesitating voice: "I think I should like to--to--dust out the room before I unpack, please." "By all means--by all means," said Hilary Vance cheerfully; and he went back to his work.
Owing to his absorption in it he failed to perceive the curious measures Pollyooly took to dust out the bedroom.

She put on an apron, fastened up her hair and covered it with a large cotton handkerchief, rolled up her sleeves, and carried a broom, two pails of hot water from the kitchen, a scrubbing-brush, and a very large piece of soap into the room she proposed to dust.

She shut herself in, took the counterpane off the bed, shook it with furious vigour, and even more vigourously still banged it against the end of the bedstead.