Certainly I heard enough to make me know that, excepting the housekeeper, neither Mr. nor Mrs. Sutton had a friend among their “help.” Unlike the horde of foreigners who have usurped their rightful places, negro servants are loyal to their employers. A negro, as a rule, has too much self-esteem to belittle the person from whom he takes wages.
Sutton House was crowded with guests every week-end, but from Monday noon to Friday afternoon Mrs. Sutton was generally alone with her little son and his tutor. Mr. Sutton usually returned to the city with the first of his guests to leave Monday morning, and seldom made his appearance before Saturday afternoon. He stood well in his profession, was a hard worker, and might have been devoted to his home had the distance between his office and Sutton House admitted of his spending his nights there.
Mrs. Sutton, so I learned from the housekeeper, was an only child of wealthy parents—the darling of her old father, who had insisted on humoring every whim. It being her whim to come to Sutton House before her husband’s business permitted him to leave town, the family had moved out.
Compared with the department store, the premium station, and the Sea Foam Hotel this position was a holiday among perfect surroundings. It is true that week-ends every servant had as much as he or she could properly do. The rest of the time the chambermaids finished their work before ten o’clock. After that I arranged for them to go off, leaving two on watch until lunch-time. At lunch the watch changed, and again at seven, their dinner-hour. This last watch remained on until ten, which was supposed to be the family bedtime. All that was required of them was to sit, one on each bedroom floor, and be ready to respond promptly when called. While on watch I encouraged, or at least I tried to encourage, these girls to read, to sew, or do any quiet handiwork.
So far as I saw, it was effort thrown away. Not one of the five ever darned her stockings—of course they all wore silk stockings, also silk underwear. Indeed, I believe three out of the five boasted that she never wore anything besides silk except when she was on duty. Instead of employing her mind or her fingers, one and all of the five would sit gazing out the nearest window and resort to all sorts of tricks to go to the servants’ quarters. Judging by these women, and the thousands of other men and women of the same race, I am convinced that what we are pleased to call “wonderful Irish imagination” is the result of idleness—air-castle building. They are the most gorgeous of liars.
Each and every one of the maids at Sutton House claimed to be direct descendants of an Irish king. One of them assured me that if she had her “rights” she would be living in a palace and never have to “turn her hand”—the Princess Royal of Ireland. Each one of them had so many saints in her family that I used to wonder how she kept track of them all. Needless to say, they were inveterate churchgoers. Such weird ideas as they attributed to their priest!
“Father Hallahan said we were not to abuse the Germans,” one of them told the Italian scrubwoman. “The Germans are good friends to the Irish.”
This failing to impress the scrubwoman, the Princess Royal gave additional information.
“Yes, and the order came straight from Rome,” said she, with a defiant toss of her nappy-looking head.
This so aroused the little Italian woman that she damned the Germans and she damned the Irish, but most of all she damned Rome. I have never seen a more furious human being. How she rolled out Italian swear words! Her husband was in the Italian army and she was struggling to keep their little home together and their children at school. Her father, her brother, and two of her husband’s brothers had been killed in the war.