“How can you keep it from her when the man’s gone? Won’t she be asking to see him?”
“There’s ways of doing things. What would you say now if I was to tell her that the doctor had gone off on a holiday for six weeks with the permission of the Board of Guardians and that there’d have to be a substitute appointed in his place? Would she be contented with that, do you think?”
“She might,” said Patsy, “but she might not. She’d be wanting his address anyway.”
“If she wanted it, it would be mighty hard to keep it from the like of that one.”
“You haven’t got it to give, and so you can’t give it,” said Patsy.
Miss Blow came downstairs as he spoke and walked up to Jimmy O’Loughlin.
“Will you kindly have some luncheon ready for me,” she said, “at two o’clock?”
“Certainly, miss, why not? Is there any particular thing that your ladyship would fancy, such as a chop or the like?”
He reverted to the “ladyship” again, although he knew her name and degree. The girl’s manner seemed to force him to. She deserved something better than a mere “miss.”
“In the meanwhile will you be so good as to tell me where Dr. O’Grady lives?”