"I suppose that's one way of looking at it," he said kindly to Ben. Although Sweet Thing was not entirely oblivious to Ben's tone, he didn't pay it much mind. He simply smiled at both doctors and nodded his head gladly at Esras's report. "Good, good."
When Esras inquired as to how he was, Sweet Thing crossed his arms over his chest and pursed his lips lightly. "Things are," he struggled a moment with putting it into the simplest, least informing terms, "hectic. To say the least. But my house call has a little less to do with business than it should, I'm afraid." In truth he was mostly there to see Atropine with his own eyes and make sure that she was doing all right. He had a few things to square away with her, yes, but it was mostly that he wanted to check in on her. She was the youngest of the girls and, though he would deny it til the day he died, his favorite. There was just a very special place in his heart for her and he needed to see how she was.
"I do need to speak with the four of you, separately, of course; or, rather, in pairs; but I must confess I'm more here to see how our girl is doing."
"But first thing's first. With things heading the way they are, the decision has been reached to continue to keep this location very quiet. There will be a few high-risk and high-priority members of the organization who will know where you are, but we just can't afford for you to be servicing people with sprained ankles and the like. Nor can there be that much traceable traffic into this area. It's just too much a risk."