Paddy The Next Best Thing

Paddy (she ought to have been a boy but was "the next best thing") adores her sister Eileen and her father. When either of these is threatened, Paddy becomes a veritable little fury. Three years before the play starts Eileen has met and been attracted by the attentions of Laurence Blake. Soon she finds Blake is more attracted by her own vivid personality than by the sweet but careless Eileen. This arouses Paddy's hatred, and we get a series of amusing scenes between the man and the maid. In the last act Paddy's resistance is vanquished, and Eileen is happy in the love that stood at her elbow for many years.