That would give her the impression, at any rate, that there were two kinds of butter. Confound it all, by what right did she assume without asking that I had a preference for fresh?
I have now been in my rooms nearly a year. Something must be done soon. My breakfasts are becoming a farce. Meals which I used to enjoy I now face as an ordeal. Is there to be no hope for me in the future?
Well, there is a chance? I shall have to wait until July; but with something definite in view I am content to wait.
In July I hope to go to Switzerland for a month. Two days before returning home I shall write to my housekeeper. Having announced the day of my return, and given one or two instructions, I shall refer briefly to the pleasant holiday which I have been enjoying. I shall remark perhaps on the grandeur of the mountains and the smiling beauty of the valleys, I may mention the area in square miles of the country....
And I shall dwell upon the habits of the native.
"... They live (I shall write) in extraordinary simplicity, chiefly upon the products of their farms. Their butter is the most delightful I have ever tried. It is a little salt to the taste, but after four weeks of it I begin to feel that I shall never be able to do without salt butter again! No doubt, as made in London it would be different from this, but I really think I must give it a trial. So when you are ordering the things I mentioned for me, will you ask for salt butter...."
And if that fails there remains only the one consolation. In three years my lease is up. I shall take a new flat somewhere, and on the very first day I shall have a word with the new housekeeper.
"By the way," I shall say, "about the butter...."