"There is a messenger over from Cahercalla to say that Masther Lancelot will be home to-morry—he has a cart with him," announced Naylour impatiently, "an' his mamma 'd like the loan of the bath-chair."
George Freyne went out fussily.
"Why Lancelot should bring a cart with him," said Mrs. Freyne vaguely. "So little room, I should have thought, on the troopships, unless it was the one which hurt him, as a memento. Gheena says a cart ran over him. Oh, thank you, Gheena darling, poached eggs for me and Darby. I was hungry."
Her pleasure in the forbidden breakfast and its hurried bolting before her husband came back made Mrs. Freyne too busy to hear Darby's murmur of "It was the messenger's cart, not Lancelot's."
"Dearest George gets quite faddy, you know," she apologized, "about everything, and we never spend our income—at least, I don't think so. Gheena, Mrs. Keefe thinks that last year's 'Unto Us' is in the attic here, and ought to do in a war year with fresh holly. She is not sure if the 'Hallelulias!' were used to stuff the cat pin-cushions for the bazaar, or if some of them came back as they were. What do you think, Gheena?"
"A cart-load of them came back," said Gheena, "and everyone can just put on holly-berries and save pounds of trouble."
"It is not in the lofts or the coach-houses; then where is it? for I must know." George Freyne drove Naylour and Maria the housemaid into the room before him. "A bath-chair in perfect order, which Mrs. Freyne's mother used."
"Unless they broke it up for firewood, sir," suggested Naylour, looking anxious.
"I lent it to Andy Cassidy's mother two years ago," said Mrs. Freyne, "and I think she died in it; and I would not have it back; she had something unpleasant, I know. Then I think it got broken. Tell the messenger, Naylour, that Mrs. Keefe has an excellent bath-chair and quite new. Oh, I did not ask you about lending it, Dearest, because probably you weren't here, or perhaps I thought you might have objected and one wheel was quite bad."
George Freyne carved pheasant furiously.