It was before dinner that I went home that first Sunday, and afterward father had to be left quiet, and Louey and Rosey went to Sunday-school. I'd been used to go too from Mr. Kingscote's, as he liked me to belong to the class of big boys; but I could not know yet how it would be from Mr. Laurence's house; and this day I wanted most of all to have a talk alone with my mother. She saw I wanted that; and when the children were gone, she began by asking if I was happy.
"Yes," I said, "Mr. Laurence was so good;" and I told her all about what he had said to me the first evening.
"Right too!" said she. "You can't be too careful, Miles. If Mr. Laurence is to trust you, there's no other way."
"Only I may speak out to you, mother," I said.
"No," said she; "not one single thing to do with Mr. Laurence's ways or habits, nor with his work. Not a single thing that you don't feel sure he'd wish me to know. If you've troubles of your own, you may tell them to me."
"Well, I don't know if I ought to call them troubles," I said, and I laughed. "Not quite so bad as that; only I don't think the servants like me being there."
"Which servants?" said she.
"Why,—all of them," I said, "except the gardener. Mrs. Crane, the housekeeper, and Mrs. Perkins, the cook, and the parlour-maid and the housemaid and the under-housemaid. I don't think any of them like me."
She asked one or two questions, and when I told her I had my meals with Mrs. Crane, and was allowed in rooms where they mightn't go, she said, "That's it!"
"What is?" I asked.