“Lord a mercy!” I cried out, believing the man wanted to recommend me a negress. “Oh la! all the blacks do, and I wouldn’t have one of them about my house for all I’m worth.”
“Then may be, mum,” he continued, “you’d like one a trifle gayer. Now, there’s a Madame Pompadour we’ve got that I think would just suit you. That’s a remarkable showy one, to be sure, and likes a good deal of raking.”
“Oh, I see,” I replied; “a French bit of goods. No, thank you; they are all of them a great deal too gay by half to please me.”
“Well, mum, if that wont suit you,” he replied, “what would you think of a nice Chinese? We’ve got a perfect beauty, I can assure you—just the very thing for you, mum—climb up anywhere—run all along the area-railings, mum—crawl right over your back-garden door—then up the house into your drawing-room balcony—almost like a wild one, mum.”
“Like a wild one!” I almost shrieked, horror-struck at the idea of intrusting my sweet, little, helpless angel of a Kate to the care of a creature with any such extraordinary propensities. “Too like a wild one for me. I don’t want any such things about my house.”
“But if you object to their running about so much, mum,” he went on, “it’s very easy to tie them up and give them a good trimming occasionally, and then you can keep them under as much as you please.”
“I don’t want one,” I replied, “that will require so much looking after, but one that you know could be trusted anywhere—especially as there will be a little baby to be taken care of.”
“A little baby! Oh! then, if that’s the case, mum,” he had the impudence to say, “I should think you had better have a monthly one while you are about it.”
“A monthly one!” I exclaimed, thinking he was referring to a second Mrs. Toosypegs, instead of a rose; “what can you be thinking of? I tell you I don’t want anything of the kind.”
“Yes, but I’m sure you don’t know how hardy they are, mum,” he added, quite coolly. “I can give you my word, we’ve got one that’s out now, mum, that went through all the severe frosts of last winter with nothing more than a bit of matting as a covering at night-time. Though, for the matter of that, almost all our monthlies are the same, and don’t seem to care where they are put, for really and truly I do think that they would go on just as well, mum, even if their beds were chock full of gravel.”