“I happened to be passing,” she explained, and I forbore to smile at the coincidence, “so I thought I might as well drop in and hear what you wanted to ask me about.”
She seated herself in the patients’ chair and laying a bundle of newspapers on the table, glared at me expectantly.
“Thank you, Miss Oman,” said I. “It is very good of you to look in on me. I am ashamed to give you all this trouble about such a trifling matter.”
She rapped her knuckles impatiently on the table.
“Never mind about the trouble,” she exclaimed tartly. “What—is—it—that—you—want—to—ask—me about?”
I stated my difficulties in respect of the supper-party, and, as I proceeded, an expression of disgust and disappointment spread over her countenance.
“I don’t see why you need have been so mysterious about it,” she said glumly.
“I didn’t mean to be mysterious; I was only anxious not to make a mess of the affair. It’s all very fine to assume a lofty scorn of the pleasures of the table, but there is great virtue in a really good feed, especially when low-living and high-thinking have been the order of the day.”
“Coarsely put,” said Miss Oman, “but perfectly true.”
“Very well. Now, if I leave the management to Mrs. Gummer, she will probably provide a tepid Irish stew with flakes of congealed fat on it, and a plastic suet-pudding or something of that kind, and turn the house upside down in getting it ready. So I thought of having a cold spread and getting the things from outside. But I don’t want it to look as if I had been making enormous preparations.”
“They won’t think the things came down from heaven,” said Miss Oman.
“No, I suppose they won’t. But you know what I mean. Now, where do you advise me to go for the raw materials of conviviality?”
Miss Oman reflected. “You had better let me do your shopping and manage the whole business,” was her final verdict.
This was precisely what I wanted, and I accepted thankfully, regardless of the feelings of Mrs. Gummer. I handed her two pounds, and, after some protests at my extravagance, she bestowed them in her purse; a process that occupied time, since that receptacle, besides being a sort of miniature Record Office of frayed and time-stained bills, already bulged with a lading of draper’s samples, ends of tape, a card of linen buttons, another of hooks and eyes, a lump of beeswax, a rat-eaten stump of leadpencil, and other trifles that I have forgotten. As she closed the purse at the imminent risk of wrenching off its fastenings she looked at me severely and pursed her lips.
“You’re a very plausible young man,” she remarked.
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
“Philandering about museums,” she continued, “with handsome young ladies on the pretense of work. Work, indeed! Oh, I heard her telling her father about it. She thinks you were perfectly enthralled by the mummies and dried cats and chunks of stone and all the other trash. She doesn’t know what humbugs men are.”
“Really, Miss Oman,” I began.
“Oh, don’t talk to me!” she snapped. “I can see it all. You can’t impose upon me. I can see you staring into those glass cases, egging her on to talk and listening open-mouthed and bulging-eyed and sitting at her feet—now, didn’t you?”
“I don’t know about sitting at her feet,” I said, “though it might easily have come to that with those infernal slippery floors; but I had a very jolly time, and I mean to go again if I can. Miss Bellingham is the cleverest and most accomplished woman I have ever spoken to.”
This was a poser for Miss Oman, whose admiration and loyalty, I knew, were only equaled by my own. She would have liked to contradict me, but the thing was impossible. To cover her defeat she snatched up the bundle of newspapers and began to open them out.
“What sort of stuff is ‘hibernation’?” she demanded suddenly.
“Hibernation!” I exclaimed.
“Yes. They found a patch of it on a bone that was discovered in a pond at St. Mary Cray, and a similar patch on one that was found at some other place in Essex. Now, I want to know what ‘hibernation’ is.”
“You must mean ‘eburnation,’ ” I said, after a moment’s reflection.
“The newspapers say ‘hibernation,’ and I suppose they know what they are talking about. If you don’t know what it is, don’t be ashamed to say so.”
“Well, then, I don’t.”
“In that case you had better read the papers and find out,” she said, a little illogically. And then: “Are you fond of murders? I am, awfully.”
“What a shocking little ghoul you must be!” I exclaimed.
She stuck out her chin at me. “I’ll trouble you,” she said, “to be a little more respectful in your language. Do you realize that I am old enough to be your mother?”
“Impossible!” I ejaculated.
“Fact,” said Miss Oman.
“Well, anyhow,” said I, “age is not the only qualification. And besides, you are too late for the billet. The vacancy’s filled.”
Miss Oman slapped the papers down on the table and rose abruptly.
“You had better read the papers and see if you can learn a little sense,” she said severely as she turned to go. “Oh, and don’t forget the finger!” she added eagerly. “That is really thrilling.”
“The finger?” I repeated.
“Yes. They found a hand with one missing. The police think it is an important clue. I don’t know what they mean; but you read the account and tell me what you think.”
With this parting injunction she bustled out through the surgery, and I followed to bid her a ceremonious adieu
