‘You are late,’ observed Mrs. Jordan reprovingly; ‘that is not like your usual habits.’
‘I thought you might like to have a little time to yourselves, my dear,’ replied the other with great simplicity. ‘I am quite sorry to trouble you with business matters, Mr. Erin, but the fact is it’s pressing. I must have Edmunda altered; she is heavy in hand.’
‘But, my dear madam, what has that to do with me?’
‘With you? Why, everything; to whom else can I come? Kemble won’t listen to me; your father, a most respectable man no doubt, is quite impracticable, and only raves about the Immortal Bard.’
‘But I cannot alter Shakespeare’s play, madam.’
‘Why not? He’s dead, isn’t he? Besides, his plays have been often enough altered before. Garrick did it for one.’
‘Perhaps, madam; but then I am not Garrick. I can no more alter a play than write one.’
‘Upon my word, my dear,’ interposed Mrs. Jordan, ‘there is a good deal in what Mr. Erin says. I want to have things altered in my own part, but if, as he tells us——’
‘Pooh! nonsense,’ broke in the other; ‘you have nothing to complain of in Flavia. She is in man’s clothes, which fit you to a nicety, and that is all you need care about.’