She gave the address correctly.
"Boy's name?"
She spoke carefully, as one who had prepared her statements. "He's been known as Thomas Coburn. He's really Thomas Whitelaw. His father was my second husband."
"If he's your second husband's child why is he called by your first husband's name?"
She was prepared here too. "Because I'd given up using my second husband's name. I was unhappily married."
"Is he dead?"
"Yes, he is."
Never having heard before so much of his private history, the boy registered it all. It was exactly the sort of detail for which he had been eager. It explained too that name of Whitelaw, allusions to which had puzzled him. He was so engrossed by the fact that he was not Tom Coburn but Tom Whitelaw as hardly to listen while it was explained to his mother that she would spend the night in the Female House of Detention, and be brought before the magistrate in the morning. If the boy had no friends to whom to send him he would be well taken care of elsewhere.
The phlegm to which she had for a few minutes schooled herself broke down. "Oh, can't I keep him with me? He'll cry his eyes out without me."
She was given to understand that no child above the nursing age could be put in prison even for its mother's sake. From his reverie as to Tom Whitelaw he waked to what was passing.