"Well, that's good! Any mail? I'll have to get to bed and I'll ask you to bring me tip a tray of food. Something quite simple, tea and toast or anything you can think of. This lumbago hits me every now and then."
"Where do you have lumbago?" asked Josie. "Is it in your face or your stomach?"
"Back, f——! Back!"
Josie realized her master had almost called her a fool and felt the compliment highly. "The bigger fool he thinks I am the better I am attending to my business," she thought.
"I bane sorry. Don't you want me to iron your back, sir? In my country we iron backs. I can iron very well, sir. You will see your laundry on your bed. I have ironed it so well I feel sure you could trust your back to me. I did not put your wash away, fearing you might think I bane meddlin."
"Oh, that's all right, my girl. I fancy what meddling you do will make no difference to me. Just don't get my papers mixed up."
"Sure, I bane careful with all such things. Your letters are on your desk."
"Well, bring them up to me when you bring my tea and toast. They will keep until then. I must get to bed." He walked with his back bent. Evidently every movement was painful.
"I'll feel sorry for him again if I don't look out," muttered Josie. "I think I'll keep these porridge bowls where I can look at them to keep myself from weakening. Polly, you stay there," she said, putting the rabbits behind a big silver pitcher. "And Peter, you can hide behind this fruit bowl. Don't crow too loud, little chickens, but just loud enough to keep me from being too sorry for that handsome wretch upstairs, with his noble brow and the lumbago in his back."
Josie arranged a tray for the sick man deftly and neatly. To the toast and tea she added a fluffy omelette and, with the letters carefully tucked in by the teapot, she tripped up to the master's room. He had piled the beautifully ironed shirts on a chair and was in bed, groaning from the extra exertion of undressing.