Her first care was to find out how long a sentence a woman had. That determined one qualification for her own service. If the sentence were for two or three years, and there was to be a vacancy in her own family, the woman was eligible to a place there, provided she could be trained into the work required.
This care was taken to save herself and her Housekeeper the trouble of changing.
To oversee her housekeeping was the Supervisor's pet employment, and it was fortunate for the Housekeeper that the government super-official had one pet. Through that partiality, she got two hours and a half more sleep in the morning than the rest of us.
She was not called till half past six; but I unlocked her women at the same time that I did the others.
I was glad she could be so favored; but I could not see the justice of such an arrangement.
I found, in the course of time, that it was a system of mutual favor. I went in to breakfast one morning, and there was no milk on the table.
Katie, the table girl, went to the refrigerator, that stood in the room, to get me some. She had just laid her hand upon the bowl when the Housekeeper, with a quick motion, arrested her.
"I must have that cream for the Master's breakfast!" she whispered.
She took the bowl, removed the cream into one pitcher, poured the skimmed milk into the one Katie held in her hand, and sent it to me.
I was not particularly anxious to drink skimmed milk in my tea so that the Master might have cream; but I supposed it was in some way to contribute to the support of the institution; or that there was an order of the Board to that effect, so I made no complaint. Indeed it was my policy not to appear to notice what was going on in such trifling matters,—trifling to the Supervisor, probably, whatever they might have been to the inferior officers.