“I should go mad if I were like that, not to be able to see where one is going. John dear, you are very patient, I shouldn’t be nearly as good as you.”
“I can quite imagine that. But it won’t be for so very long?”
Why had he ended with a question?
“Well, we must be practical. And the specialist was telling me it would be quite a long time before—before you would be up and about again. But doctors always exaggerate, you know. And there’s your poor face to get well besides.”
“But how long will it be before I shall be able to take this damned head-dress off in daylight? It was all very well when the old fool took it off in the darkened room so that I couldn’t see anything, nor he either. His breath did smell nasty, too.”
“My dear boy, I never notice people’s breath.”
“‘May be the sign of a deep-rooted disorder.’ ‘Even your best friends won’t tell you.’ ‘Halitosis is an insidious enemy,’ and so on. And an American firm has got the only thing on God’s earth that will cure you. He ought to take it, really.”
“John, I do wish you would not swear like that. The servants would be very shocked if they knew, and it is such a bad example to the village boys.”
“But, heavens above, they don’t hear me swear.”
“No, but they hear of it, don’t you see.”