LXXIX
Clemency Power to the Hon. Mrs. Power
Dear Mother,—Things go along very comfortably here, so comfortably that I have a guilty feeling that I am not earning my salary at all, but spending a happy visit. I now have a weekly journey to Hereford to do any extra shopping that may be needed. I go in a car in state in the morning and have lunch at the Green Dragon while the things are being packed up.
We are now reading nothing but the Times and Thackeray. Having just finished Esmond we are beginning The Virginians. Miss Raby’s father used to read it to them all and she says it brings old times back: but I should prefer a change now and then. I find that I can manage reading aloud now with much less fatigue. Don’t you think girls at school ought to be trained in it?
Did I tell you that my employer, Mr. Haven, had a wonderful Solitaire board made on which Miss Raby can play while lying at full length on her back? The cards have holes in them at the top, and are hung on instead of being laid down, as on a table. She is able to sit up better now and can use a table, but she keeps this for times when she is tired. Don’t you think it is the very thing for Grannie? I think I shall get one made and send it to her.
I have even taken on a class in the school—teaching what is called daily sense. It is the idea of my employer, Mr. Haven, and consists of showing the little beggars how wrong it is, for instance, to stand on the middle of the cane seat of a chair, instead of on the wooden edges, and things like that. The schoolmaster was very ratty about it at first, but I did some of my blarneying and now he’s a lamb.
It’s wonderful what an effect a little brogue has on these Sassenachs. I noticed it among the soldiers in France, officers and men, and it’s the same here; and I swear I never really try. But doesn’t it look as if all that poor old Ireland needed to get her way was to send out an army of Norahs and Bridgets just to talk and so convince?
Mr. Haven was here the other day. He is very nice—tall, with very soft quite white hair, prematurely white. He did Miss Raby a world of good—Your dutiful truant,
Clementia