Who's sorry now?

run clear up there,” Robert said. ”I’m sure the household wouldn’t want to be answering your calls.”
    ”I’ve thought about that and priced it. What I’d save on the boardinghouse room and the tiny overflow office there would more than make up for the cost of a telephone line. I’m sick to death of my clothes and hair smelling of cabbage. It’s the pervasive odor of the entire boardinghouse I live in now.”
    ”It takes a unanimous vote to accept a boarder,” Robert told Howard. ”But I’m sure it would be in your case.”
    Robert went on to explain what Mrs. Smithson had told him about Mrs. White’s earlier visit to Mr. Kurtz and how downright angry she’d been at the other tailor.
    ”That’s unusual. I’ve never heard her be critical of anyone. Robert, I hope you convince the people at Grace and Favor to save me from the cabbage stink.”
    That evening Robert was right. The same questions he’d asked Howard were asked of the residents and boarders and the maid Mimi.
    He waited until after dinner to raise the issue of Howard’s moving into Grace and Favor, and had asked Mrs. Prinney and Mimi to delay cleaning up after dinner for a few minutes.
    All the women instantly agreed, as he had expected they would. For one thing, Howard Walker was good looking, socially acceptable, and would increase their sense of safety, not that this was terribly important often. It was Mr. Prinney, who raised the questions. ”How would he take telephone calls? There’s only one extra line, and that’s in my home office.”
    Robert explained what Howard had said about having his own telephone line.
    And would he take all his meals here?” Mr. Prinney asked.
    ”Probably not,” Robert said. ”But we don’t all eat every meal here. Mrs. Tarkington takes a packed lunch during the school year, and Phoebe always takes one to work at her hat shop. Chief Walker would probably eat lunch at Mabel’s. It’s closer to the jail in town, where he spends most of his time.”
    The only other decision involved was which room would suit him, and it was decided that it would probably be the one across the hallway from Mrs. Tarkington’s. There was a connected bath on one side, and a closet on the other side of that room. And nobody would be bothered by a phone ringing on the second floor from a room next door.
    The cost of the room would be decided by Mr. Prinney, in private consultation with Lily and Robert when they found out about Howard’s luncheon plans.
    Robert was pleased. Aside from Mr. Prinney, he was the only man who lived at Grace and Favor. And as much as he respected and liked Mr. Prinney, they were from different generations and didn’t have a lot in common. The estate decisions that needed to be made rested mostly with Lily, who understood them far better than Robert did. It would be swell to have another man near his own age living with them.
     

CHAPTER FOUR
    Thursday, April 20
     
    THE NEXT MORNING, Robert went to the chief of police’s office in town and told Howard he’d been unanimously approved to live at Grace and Favor.
    ”That’s swell,” Walker said. ”I have to admit that I’ve already packed most of my clothes,” he said with a grin.
    ”Come up first and see the room we’ve assigned you and make sure you like it.”
    They took both their cars, and Robert led Howard up the stairs and opened the door to the room the residents had decided might suit their newest boarder. As Howard walked in he said, ”There’s lots of light from those windows and it’s a bigger room than the two rooms I had at the boardinghouse.”
    ”Sorry it’s not a river view,” Robert said.
    ”I’ve lived right by the river and don’t need to see it again. It stinks even more than the boardinghouse.”
    ”Here’s the bathroom,” Robert said, opening a door.
    Howard looked more closely and said, ”My own bathroom? I don’t have to share it?” He grinned at Robert. ”Worth the price and more. I’ve been sharing a bathroom with three other men for too long. What’s more, one of them must have read a whole magazine every time he was in there. Speaking of price, what’s it going to cost me?”
    Robert gave him the price Mrs. Tarkington paid less two dollars. ”She has the same sort of space, and a private bath. She gets breakfast, a packed lunch, and dinner. We’re charging you a little less than we charge Mrs. Tarkington. She has a river view and likes it and is willing to pay for