“Yes, sir?” she said, and a queer, cold feeling stole over her heart. “Yes, sir?”
“‘The spirit is willing, but the flesh—the flesh is weak,’” said Mr. Sleuth, with a heavy sigh.
“You studies too hard, and too long—that’s what’s ailing you, sir,” said Mr. Sleuth’s landlady suddenly.
When Mrs. Bunting went down again she found that a great deal had been settled in her absence; among other things, that Joe Chandler was going to escort Miss Daisy across to Belgrave Square. He could carry Daisy’s modest bag, and if they wanted to ride instead of walk, why, they could take the bus from Baker Street Station to Victoria—that would land them very near Belgrave Square.
But Daisy seemed quite willing to walk; she hadn’t had a walk, she declared, for a long, long time—and then she blushed rosy red, and even her stepmother had to admit to herself that Daisy was very nice looking, not at all the sort of girl who ought to be allowed to go about the London streets by herself.
CHAPTER XIII.
Daisy’s father and stepmother stood side by side at the front door, watching the girl and young Chandler walk off into the darkness.
A yellow pall of fog had suddenly descended on London, and Joe had come a full half-hour before they expected him, explaining, rather lamely, that it was the fog which had brought him so soon.
“If we was to have waited much longer, perhaps, ’twouldn’t have been possible to walk a yard,” he explained, and they had accepted, silently, his explanation.
“I hope it’s quite safe sending her off like that?” Bunting looked deprecatingly at his wife. She had already told him more than once that he was too fussy about Daisy, that about his daughter he was like an old hen with her last chicken.