"Do you care for reading?" she said, presently. "For we can lend you books, if you wish."
"Indeed, I'm no great reader, ma'am. I like to have a bit of work on 'and as will be a credit to me—them flower pieces are all my own, cross-stitch every bit of 'em; but I think I shall have no time for it now. By the time I get my places as nice as I like to have 'em, and my little meal cooked and ate, there'll be little time for idling."
"Well, but reading is not idling," said Gilbert Cloudesley.
"Ain't it, sir? Well, I don't know. A-settin' with a book in my 'and, doing nothing, I should be asleep in five minutes, sir, that's certing; even, as I said, if I had time."
"But you'll keep a girl, won't you?" asked the lady. "Miss Jones—your neighbour, you know,—she regularly trains girls for service, and so well that they always get good places when they leave her."
"Well, but you see, miss, I'm very pertic'ler, and gels is so careless and dirty, and breaks and eats so much; and I never could bear to be scolding; that's me all over, as my poor Matthew used to say. I'd rather do the work than be scolding for ever, as Miss Jones do. Besides, I like to do summut myself; I'm none of your idle ones, nor do I set up to be a fine lady."
"Miss Jones," said the curate, "says she would rather do the work herself, too; but, you see, it is a way in which she can be of use, and so she goes on with it."
"Of course, sir; and I'll think of it," said Mrs. Short smoothly. "Won't you read a little to me, sir, before you go?" she added, folding her fat hands and smiling encouragingly at him.
"Not to-day," he said, quietly; "it is late, and we must leave you now."
"And I have brought you these flowers, Mrs. Short—Christmas roses, you see. I am so fond of them. They come to tell us that we are never forgotten at any time of the year, and that summer will come again."