They heard the wheels of the coach and marched out. Alison was coming downstairs with Mrs. Weston. "What now?" says McBean glowering. "Do you need a duenna to watch you with your husband?"
"Madame is Harry's mother, sir," Alison said.
For once Captain McBean was disconcerted. "A thousand pardons," says he, and with much ceremony put Mrs. Weston into the coach.
As they rode after it, "You fight too fast, sir," says O'Connor with a grin. "I have remarked it before."
Captain McBean 'was still something out of countenance. "Who would have thought he had a mother here?" he growled.
"Oh, faith, you did not suppose the old Colonel brought him forth—like
Jove plucking Minerva out of his swollen head."
"I did not, Patrick, you loon. But I did not guess his mother would be here with this gorgeous madame wife."
"Fie now, is it the Lord God don't advise you of everything? 'Tis an indignity, faith."
Captain McBean swore at him in a friendly way, and they jogged on through the Islington lanes….
So after a while it happened that Colonel Boyce, raising a hot and angry head at the creature who dared open his bedroom door, found himself looking at Mrs. Weston. "Ods my life! Kate! What a pox do you want here?" says he.