"I don't wonder the man is ill here!" she said to herself, as the door
of the house they stopped at opened and she snuffed the atmosphere.
"The place reeks--and--oh! gracious! is this the landlady?"
Yet the woman was ordinary enough--the type of landlady one sees in
all back streets--greasy face, straggling hair, dirty blouse, black
hands, bitten fingernails, short skirts, prodigious feet, a grubby
child clinging on to her dress and every indication of the speedy
arrival of another.
"I suppose you're 'is mother hain't you, mum?" she said, gaping at
Miss Templeton's rather fashionable clothes in open-mouthed wonder. "I
told 'im 'ee ought not to go out, but 'ee never 'eeds what I says."
Miss Templeton, though not particularly flattered at being taken for
Shiel's mother--since, like most ladies of mature age, she wished to
be regarded as much younger--nevertheless, thought it better not to
disillusion the woman. The poor, she told herself, often have very
decided views on propriety. With the woman's aid she got Shiel
upstairs, and, as he was too feeble to undress himself, despite his
protestations, helped to disrobe him. She had thought, when she first
saw the slum, of returning to Kew at once, but she did no such thing.
She stayed with Shiel; persuaded the landlady to make him some gruel
(which proved to be a sorry mess, but had at least the advantage of
being hot), and bribed one of the children to fetch the doctor.
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