Read "Jewel Mysteries" by Max Pemberton online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
I was struggling heroically to force my arms through the sleeves of a well-starched shirt, when the man knocked upon the door of my bedroom for the second time. I had heard him faintly five minutes before, when my head was as far in a basin as the limitations of Parisian toilet-ware would allow it to go; but now he knocked imperiously, and when I opened to him he stood hesitatingly with a foolish leer upon his face, and that which he meant for discretion upon his lips.
"Well," said I, "what the devil do you want? Can't you see I'm dressing?"