“You mean you didn’t cook it,” said Ethel, with just a touch of sarcasm.
“Well, what I didn’t do, I didn’t do for you. I thought you’d had enough of the kitchen, and if you disguise this with sugar and cream it will be all right.”
But this was an exaggeration. We could not pretend to eat the gluey mass, so I said,
“Well, anyhow, there are nice fresh eggs. It doesn’t take a great deal of skill to boil them.”
“Did you use the three-minute glass,” said Ethel, as she helped me to two eggs and then took two herself.
I told her that I didn’t know what she meant; that I used no glass at all, but had boiled them in the under part of the oatmeal boiler, as I had noticed Minerva do.
“Yes, but how long?” asked Ethel, as she took up her knife and chipped the shell of one.
“About an hour and a half,” said she, answering her own question. “You meant well, Philip, but you didn’t know. These are as hard as a rock and not yet cold. I hope the coffee is better.”
Ethel is not usually so fault finding, but I laid it to her broken sleep, and said,
“The bread is cut pretty well. And the butter is just as good as if Minerva had put it on the table herself.”