A Christmas Story Part 4

But now I had soup every day, and whenever I saw anything very good in market I ordered it home and had it cooked. Strange isn't it, with the same range and the same cook? Before my reign we could not breakfast till nine, the cook said that the milkman came so late. During my reign we breakfasted at eight punctually, for I suggested to her the propriety of rising at six instead of seven and letting him in on his first trip instead of taking the milk from him on his return. My sister was obliged to tell her two or three days before hand that she was going to have company, that she might have time to get everything ready for dinner. I frequently brought home two or three guests with fish and game in the same carriage and ordered it as the fourth course while partaking of soup. On one occasion I brought in partridges twenty minutes before dinner. I went down stairs knowing she would be roused this time, and flanked her by saying, 'Hannah, you won't have time to pick those birds, so just draw them and _skin_ them. I want them roasted.' Before she recovered from her astonishment I had departed.

Whenever a quarrel down stairs took place I never interfered as long as they did not talk loud, but the next day if I noticed any one in the sulks or a tendency to let things go by, I had the furniture of one room changed to another. This required 'all hands' to work together, and I made them fly round so, that when it was done they were only too happy to go to lunch and rest, and I could hear many a joke and pleasant laugh rise from the kitchen table.

One rainy evening, as my sister and myself were sitting in front of the wood fire, exactly two months since the famous contract, and very much in the same position, and talking over everything but it, a timid knock was heard. I said 'come in,' and Sabina entered, looking very healthy and neat--I cannot say pretty, though she had a good figure.

I never asked questions on these occasions. I always made it difficult for them to talk in this, to them, gloomy room.--They had to stumble through themselves.

'Can I speak to you, sir.'

'Certainly, Sabina--go on.'

'I have come to say, sir, that--that--I have came to say, sir, that'--a pause; she looked very guilty.

'That's right, Sabina; you have come to say that--I understand--but what have you come to say?'

'I have come to say, sir, that--I have come to go, sir!'

I controlled myself. She was an excellent chambermaid; understood my ways thoroughly; and did her work well; had always been respectful to _me_, and was very steady. It would be a great loss, but DISCIPLINE must be preserved, and my mind was at once made up. My sister looked surprised and sorry right out.

'Well, Sabina, when do you wish to go.'

'On Sat.u.r.day, sir.'

Oh how my sister wanted to speak, but I looked at the tin box that held the contract and she bit her lip.

'Very well, Sabina, you have a perfect right to go when and where you please, and I will take great pleasure in writing out an excellent character for you. Let me see, (looking at my account book) that is two weeks wages making $8. I never make presents, but as you are going here is a ten dollar bill. Where would you like your trunk carried, tell me and I will send it by Thomas Sat.u.r.day morning?'

'Oh! it isn't that, sir,' said she, 'but--but, sir,' with the tears flowing rapidly.

'Why, what is the matter, Sabina?' (the first question apart from business I had ever asked.)

'I don't want to leave you, sir.'

'Well, that is strange, then why do you?' (business question.)

'I'm going, sir--I'm going, sir, to--be--married!' and she burst into tears.

(I congratulated myself on being a bachelor, if conjugal affection produced such an effect.)

'Oh! that's it,' said I, dryly. 'Well I hope you will be happy.'

'But you've been so kind, sir, you--'

'There now stop, I have only tried to be just,' said I, looking exultingly at my smiling sister, who took off a little gold stud and gave it to her with many wishes of a happy life.

Everything went on regularly as clock-work. There was a place for everything, and everything in its place. When the bell rang during dear Mary's sway, it continued to ring, and on one occasion, a friend met me in the street and said:

'Why William, have you moved?'

I replied no, that we were very comfortable where we were, 'why do you ask?'

'That's very strange,' said he, 'we called yesterday at one o'clock and rang for twenty minutes. No one coming we concluded you had left for Europe.'

'No,' I said, feeling rather confused, 'the waiter I believe is subject to sciatica. At times he is taken suddenly and cannot move, and the reason we did not hear the bell, (I looked away as I said so,) his cries of pain are such that you cannot hear yourself speak.'

Now the door is answered before the first ring stops sounding. For I arranged it so as to vibrate long enough to give a person time to go from any part of the house in exactly two minutes; and no man of the world rings oftener than once every three minutes. I would not have written all this but my blessed sister soon entirely followed out my reformation and is fairly convinced, as she says, that when a man sets about any matter, he is very thorough: clear headed; and, above all, not easily put down.

Oh! if all women thought so! eh, Mr. Caudle? I knew one learned gentleman who only desired peace and good food. His wife never allowed him to offer a suggestion. She called him a genius, and made him mind.

Formerly Mary rose thoughtful, with the pressure of business on her brain. At meals she was abstracted, often worried, and at all times the repository of domestic troubles. Her healthy organization was altogether too mesmerized by the petty warfare below stairs. She was never idle, and yet rarely accomplished anything for _herself_. Her position in the household might have been called that of GRAND FINISHER. She planned work and waited for its completion in vain. Finally she would bring it into the library and st.i.tch--st.i.tch--all through the pleasant evenings.

I knew this, for I laid a plan. One April I asked her to work me a pair of slippers on cloth. I presume a clever woman, undisturbed, could have delivered them over to me at the end of the week. Now, no one is more clever than my sister; yet I did not get those slippers till December; and then she handed them to me in sadness, and said, with an attempt at cheerfulness, 'dear William, I worked one myself, but my duties are such that I gave out the other to that poor woman whose husband is at sea.

Has'nt she done it well?' Now, I find her reading, paying visits, and often of an evening she comes to me and says, 'William, would'nt you like some new handkerchiefs embroidered?' or 'can't I mend anything for you? I have just finished my music and have nothing to do.'

On another occasion, while she was mending--not making reader--but _mending_, her children's clothes, I offered to read one of Ik Marvel's reveries of a bachelor, a special favorite of mine. She thanked me, and I proceeded. On finis.h.i.+ng one of his admirable paragraphs, I put the book down and exclaimed, 'isn't that capital?'

She said at once, 'no, I think it is very discouraging.'

'Discouraging! Why, what in the world do you mean, Mary?'

'Excuse me, William, but I was'nt listening. The fact of it is, there has been another row down stairs, and I do think that girl ought to be ashamed of herself to treat Susan so;' and then for _one_ hour a topographical and a.n.a.lytical history of the entire household was gone into, with a _con amore_ spirit, which lasted through two segars and a gla.s.s of water. I never spoke. On these occasions they don't want you to talk; only to listen. They say in a sweet and confiding manner, 'you know I have no one to sympathize with me;' and off they go, like the recitation of Pope's Homer, made by some school girl who has been sentenced to run through so many lines. I slipped the reveries into their place, so that she would not be hurt, and I do a.s.sure you that when she had got through I believe if you had asked her suddenly 'who discovered America?' she would have replied 'An Irishman--I forget his name.'

Formerly there was ever a business gravity about her: now she always appeared with a sweet smile that lit up her countenance, as though it had been sprinkled all over with sun-powder.

Difficult indeed was it for Mary to order anything without an advance notice, for otherwise she was forced to start her little bark through the Scylla and Charybdis of 'fire island,' namely, 'The fire's too low, marm;' or 'I've just put on coal, marm.'

Now she reads to me herself, and marks the prettiest pa.s.sages in Tennyson, which no woman could find out if her understanding had been mortgaged by servants.

Before, no matter what dish of meat was set before me, it was always _dry_, or the gravy made of b.u.t.ter and _water_. I have often seen mutton chops come on table looking like little islands of meat surrounded by water, on which might be detected a tickley benders of grease. Five minutes conversation on my part supplied the deficiency, and caused one can of lard to outlast six of those in olden times.

When I first took charge of the kitchen, the cook made one struggle--but only one. The reply to her question indicated such ignorance or indifference on my part, that everything suggested in future was served as directed, and well done. Having ordered many dishes one day--I don't know whether it was was.h.i.+ng or ironing day, I never used to ask: I also gave the ingredients of a very nice pudding, and said 'can you make that?'

'I know how, sir, but can't to-day.'

'Why not?'

'There is no room in the oven, you have filled it with your orders, and it is impossible to bake it this afternoon.'

'You cannot bake it, then?'

'No, sir.'

'Then _broil_ it!'