“O! they do very well here?” interrupted Biddy, looking closely at the leaf in her hand.
“Hear me out,—but if I were to remove Joe into a higher sphere, as I shall hope to remove him when I fully come into my property, they would hardly do him justice.”
“And don’t you think he knows that?” asked Biddy.
It was such a very provoking question (for it had never in the most distant manner occurred to me), that I said, snappishly,—
“Biddy, what do you mean?”
Biddy, having rubbed the leaf to pieces between her hands,—and the smell of a black-currant bush has ever since recalled to me that evening in the little garden by the side of the lane,—said, “Have you never considered that he may be proud?”
“Proud?” I repeated, with disdainful emphasis.
“O! there are many kinds of pride,” said Biddy, looking full at me and shaking her head; “pride is not all of one kind—”
“Well? What are you stopping for?” said I.
“Not all of one kind,” resumed Biddy. “He may be too proud to let any one take him out of a place that he is competent to fill, and fills well and with respect. To tell you the truth, I think he is; though it sounds bold in me to say so, for you must know him far better than I do.”