For the second time that morning the door was slammed by an angry visitor.
“He didn’t like his message,” Linden explained to his wife. “It was his poor mother. She is fretting over him. Lord! if folk only knew these things it would do them more good than all the forms and ceremonies.”
“Well, Tom, it’s not your fault if they don’t,” his wife answered. “There are two women waiting to see you. They have not an introduction but they seem in great trouble.”
“I’ve a bit of a headache. I haven’t got over last night. Silas and I are the same in that. Our night’s work finds us out next morning. I’ll just take these and no more, for it is bad to send anyone sorrowin’ away if one can help it.”
The two women were shown in, both of them austere figures dressed in black, one a stern-looking person of fifty, the other about half that age.
“I believe your fee is a guinea,” said the elder, putting that sum upon the table.
“To those who can afford it,” Linden answered. As a matter of fact, the guinea often went the other way.
“Oh, yes, I can afford it,” said the woman. “I am in sad trouble and they told me maybe you could help me.”
“Well, I will if I can. That’s what I am for.”
“I lost my poor husband in the war—killed at Ypres he was. Could I get in touch with him?”