“What is it, dear?” she asked, as the middle-aged, slightly bent figure toiled up the steps exhaustedly.
“Where is Gloria?” was Mr. McAndrew's reply, as he dropped with a sigh of relief into one of the piazza chairs.
“Gone with Miss—I can't think of her name—the District Nurse. She would go—you mustn't blame me. Ask Abou Ben if she wasn't the settest little thing!”
“I was afraid so—felt it in my bones. Now, why,” groaned the lawyer, “must she have selected today? And here I've come up home at the risk of my life all to no end! I wanted to make sure she wasn't poking round in that miserable street today, of all days—and you have to tell me she is!”
“You mustn't blame me,” his wife repeated mildly. “You know yourself when Glory's set—”
“Yes, but you ought to have been set, too! Why didn't you put your foot down that she shouldn't go off to such a foolish place? No knowing what mischief it has done!” worried a look as did her husband's. Then she added, “If we had explained the whole thing to her at the start, it would not have been so difficult. But how is anyone to tell her now? She is so intense, and she's hardly more than a child to reason with. And in the meantime she's gotten so many ideas into her head that she wouldn't have had, maybe, if she had known the situation from the first, and grown up with it.”
“I acted for the best,” her husband grumbled. “Such things are coming up in life all the time. But when women are mixed up in 'em, there's no making them see straight. It wasn't fitting that Gloria should have everything explained to her at the start. It wasn't businesslike. When she comes into full control of things herself, it will be different. I am afraid Richards is not quite the man to have charge of things down there. I have given him his own way too much. But one has to with Richards. He's a good collector.”
“But the stair-rail, dear,” interposed his wife. “Stair-railings should be secure, above all things.”
“Yes, Richards ought to have seen that everything was safe. I cannot understand a glaring negligence like that. He's always given me the impression that things were kept very fairly shipshape.” Having said this, Mr. McAndrew rose and began pacing the veranda.
“Richards said it was a poor, half-witted creature,” he murmured, as though thinking aloud.