The Veiled Man by Ambrose Pratt — Read

Simon Vicars would have been perfectly happy that day, but for one thing; Norah Flaherty was growing troublesome. He met her in the street on his way to the post office, and she contrived to detain him for several minutes, although he pleaded urgent business, and was as nearly downright brutal in his desire to cut so public a conversation short as he dared to be. Simon thought of Norah all the way home, and his reflections were by no means grateful, if his expression might be taken as an index of his mind. During the first month or two of their acquaintance he had liked her very much, and he had ardently welcomed her evening visits to the Castle with his master's linen. Even now he remembered with pleasure some of the dainty little meals, enlivened with kisses and champagne, which they had shared together in the veiled man's dining-room. The nuisance of it was that, as his fancy cooled, Norah's liking for his society increased. For quite a long while past she made it her business to call at the Castle every third and sometimes every second night, instead of once a week. Simon had objected vainly on prudential grounds.

"Sure, ain't we kapin' company?" Norah would reply. "And aren't we almost the same as man and wife; sure whose business is it but just moine and yours, darlin'?"