"I 'spect you can, if you be the officer Tom says is comin' to see him."
"I am the person."
"Tom's very bad."
"So he says in his letter."
"He hain't had a minute's peace or comfort with that leg sence he come home from the war. Be you any relation of his?"
"I am not."
"Mebbe you're his friend."
"He served under me in the Rosalie."
"Tom hain't paid no board for two months, which comes hard on a poor woman like me, takin' care of him, and his mother too, that come here to nuss him."
"Perhaps something can be done for him."