“Forgiven you!” said he, starting. “Stuff and nonsense; what’s all this about? You were a fool, that’s all.”
Deborah stared at this most unwonted address on the part of her young lady; and Lucy, a sudden light breaking on her, smiled at Eleanor, and held up her finger. Deborah proceeded with her inquiry: “Mistress Rose, shall I take some breakfast to my lady, and the young gentlemen, poor souls?”
“Yes, of course,” he answered. “No, wait a bit. Only to my mother, I mean, just at present.”
“And the soldiers,” continued Deborah—“they’re roaring for breakfast; what shall I give them?”
“A halter,” he had almost said, but he caught himself up in time, and answered, “What you can—bread, beef, beer—”
“Bread! beef! beer!” almost shrieked Deborah, “when she knows the colonel man had the last of our beer; beef we have not seen for two Christmases, and bread, there’s barely enough for my lady and the children, till we bake.”
“Well, whatever there is, then,” said Walter, anxious to get rid of her.
“I could fry some bacon,” pursued Deborah, “only I don’t know whether to cut the new flitch so soon; and there be some cabbages in the garden. Should I fry or boil them, Mistress Rose? The bottom is out of the frying-pan, and the tinker is not come this way.”
The tinker was too much for poor Walter’s patience, and flinging away from her, he exclaimed, “Mercy on me, woman, you’ll plague the life out of me!”
Poor Deborah stood aghast. “Mistress Rose! what is it? you look wildly, I declare, and your hood is all I don’t know how. Shall I set it right?”