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“The decisive expression of her great florid face satisfied her and she thought of some mothers she knew who could not get their daughters off their hands.”
Mrs. Mooney thinks this line shortly before she has Mary call Mr. Doran downstairs so that the two of them can meet to discuss the situation with him and Polly. Mrs. Mooney is “satisfied” that she is going to win the discussion with Mr. Doran, but she is specifically satisfied because she knows that she is going to get Polly “off [her] hands.” This short line proves that Mrs. Mooney allowed Mr. Doran and Polly to have a relationship because she wanted her daughter to have an advantageous match.
“[Mr. Dorna] was a serious young man, not rakish or loud-voiced like the others. If it had been Mr Sheridan or Mr Meade or Bantam Lyons her task would have been much harder. She did not think he would face publicity. All the lodgers in the house knew something of the affair; details had been invented by some. Besides, he had been employed for thirteen years in a great Catholic wine-merchant’s office and publicity would mean for him, perhaps, the loss of his job. Whereas if he agreed all might be well. She knew he had a good screw for one thing and she suspected he had a bit of stuff put by.”
In addition to highlighting Mrs. Mooney’s calculating nature, this passage also solidifies that Mrs. Mooney wants Mr. Doran for her daughter because of his finances. She is pleased that her daughter had an affair with a “serious” man who has “a bit of stuff put by” as opposed to a rake with no funds or prospects. One cannot help but wonder if Mrs. Mooney would have allowed Polly and Mr. Doran’s affair to continue if she had not suspected that he had money.
