"Well, Maria, my dear!" her husband said cheerfully.
"Oh, it's well for you, I daresay," she retorted, "you who've had an easy morning; but what about me who's been cooking all the time you've been at church? There, take your seats! Dinner's ready!"
"I often wish you'd manage to do your cooking on a Saturday and have a cold dinner on Sunday like Elizabeth," William Brown remarked; "then you'd be able to go to church—we'd such a nice service this morning, and—"
"Oh, no doubt Elizabeth's a better manager than her mother!" interrupted his wife sarcastically. "I've always cooked on Sundays, and I always shall."
It was a very good dinner, but Billy did not enjoy it, for Mrs. Brown, who carved, gave him a thick slice of fat mutton which he could not eat. Noting this, his grandfather remarked that he was not getting on, and he admitted that he did not like fat meat.
"Can't you give him a cut of lean, Maria?" William Brown suggested.
"No, I can't—not without disfiguring the joint, and I'm certainly not going to do that," Mrs. Brown answered. "Billy must learn not to be so particular. If we can eat fat meat he can."
Her husband looked troubled, but said no more. As soon as the meal was over he rose and went out, while Mrs. Brown began to put together the dinner things with a clatter of plates and dishes. Billy watched her in silence for a minute, then asked timidly: "Can I help you, Granny?"
"Help me? You?" cried Mrs. Brown, raising her eyebrows in a contemptuous fashion. "What can you do to help me, I should like to know?"
"I could wash up," Billy answered, flushing, "or I could wipe the things as you wash them—I always did that for mother. If you'll say what you'd like me to do—"