“If I understand you, you want some one to act as your housekeeper?”
“That's it! Somebody to kinder look arter things—and me—ginrally,” returned Prosper, greatly relieved.
“Of what age?” continued the manager, with a cautious glance at the robust youth and good-looking, simple face of Prosper.
“I ain't nowise partickler—ez long ez she's old—ye know. Ye follow me? Old—ez of—betwixt you an' me, she might be my own mother.”
The manager smiled inwardly. A certain degree of discretion was noticeable in this rustic youth! “You are quite right,” he answered gravely, “as yours is a mining camp where there are no other women, Still, you don't want any one TOO old or decrepit. There is an elderly maiden lady”—But a change was transparently visible on Prosper's simple face, and the manager paused.
“She oughter be kinder married, you know—ter be like a mother,” stammered Prosper.
“Oh, ay. I see,” returned the manager, again illuminated by Prosper's unexpected wisdom.
He mused for a moment. “There is,” he began tentatively, “a lady in reduced circumstances—not an inmate of this house, but who has received some relief from us. She was the wife of a whaling captain who died some years ago, and broke up her home. She was not brought up to work, and this, with her delicate health, has prevented her from seeking active employment. As you don't seem to require that of her, but rather want an overseer, and as your purpose, I gather, is somewhat philanthropical, you might induce her to accept a 'home' with you. Having seen better days, she is rather particular,” he added, with a shrewd smile.
Simple Prosper's face was radiant. “She'll have a Chinaman and a Biddy to help her,” he said quickly. Then recollecting the tastes of his comrades, he added, half apologetically, half cautiously, “Ef she could, now and then, throw herself into a lemming pie or a pot of doughnuts, jest in a motherly kind o' way, it would please the boys.”
“Perhaps you can arrange that, too,” returned the manager, “but I shall have to broach the whole subject to her, and you had better call again to-morrow, when I will give you her answer.”