Page 4 of Mann Hunt
“What—no sympathy for the guy who gets beaten up just soyoucan get a paycheque?”
“Stop your whining. Nothing appears to be broken.”
“You’re a harsh woman, Mrs B.”
She walked over to the fridge and took out an ice-pack, which she wrapped in a tea towel and handed to him. “Here. You know what to do.”
She went into his bathroom and returned with the first-aid kit.
“Take these,” she said, passing him a couple of pills. “Vitamin C might help lessen the bruising which, if I know my beatings, will be spectacular over the next few days. I’ll wrap you up to give you some support. But first… You’ve gotta go shower. You smell like you’ve spent the night in a dumpster.”
“Where do you think they threw me after they did this? It took me an hour to crawl out after I came to.”
Declan went into the bathroom and had a shower. By the time he had finished, Mrs B had laid clothes out for him on the bed. She returned with a coffee.
“It has sugar in it. I figured you could use the energy.”
He took it from her and had a sip. She stood there, trying to figure out how to break the news to him.
“You’re a lifesaver. I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Declan said, as he eased himself down onto the edge of the bed.
Mrs B paused, then said, “Well, now that you mention it… I guess there’s no point in beating around the bush.”
“I wouldn’t expect you would.”
“You remember how I told you my daughter and her friend were going on a three-week trip to South America?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Declan replied, taking another sip of his coffee.
“Well, it seems her friend tripped over her cat, and somehow fell out of her window.”
Declan choked and hot coffee shot up and out through his nose. “Ow, ow, ow,” he cried.
“Luckily she lived on the second floor, so she only broke her leg.” Mrs B shook her head.
Declan mopped his face with his towel. Mrs B took it from him and proceeded to use it to clean the floor. As she got up, her legs began to buckle and she steadied herself against a chair.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Anyway, I got a call from my daughter last night, all in tears because of her vacation. Well, it was—look, she asked me to go with her in her friend’s place and I said yes.”
She stared at him, waiting for a reaction. “Well, I couldn’t let her go on her own, could I?”
“And when does this happen?” Declan asked.
“I leave Sunday.”
“Sunday? Like this Sunday? Two days from now Sunday?”
“That would be Sunday. So, you’ll need to hire a replacement for me for the time I’ll be away.”
“Well then”—he seemed to be piecing things together—“would you call a temp agency and see what they can do?”
“You’re not going to be using one of those companies. They charge an arm and a leg, and the poor temp only sees a fraction of it. Anyway, I’ve already placed an ad on one of those job-search websites. They’ll send you a list of the top ten candidates with interview times starting on Monday.”
“Monday?”
“No need to thank me. I’m only doing my job. Now I’d better leave you to rest.”
