“Did he take his bath nicely? Was he troublesome to Jefferson? I thought I heard voices—rather loud ones.”
“Yes, ma’am, I guess you did. They had some words, them two. No, ma’am, he didn’t take his bath. He didn’t even touch to do it. Jefferson says the kid shut the door in his face, and the next he knew he heard the water running out the tub. ’Twasn’t a minute then, before he hopped right into the middle of that lovely clean bed with a kind of a yell. ‘I’m a gentleman for one night, I am!’ says he, ‘and when I’m a man I’ll be one all the time!’ But the dirty little scamp! Fooling old Jeff that way.”
“Well, he’ll do better after a little. He’s a very bright child. I can see that distinctly.”
“After a while, ma’am? Is he to stop—then?”
“Yes, Mary. He is to live here if he will. Do you know how early the stores are open in the morning?”
“Oh! along about eight o’clock, ma’am, I think.”
“Call me at seven, if you do not hear me stirring before. I suppose Jefferson could hardly have the horse ready so early?”
“He’d think it a great hardship, ma’am, and he’d be cross as two sticks all day after.”
“Yes, I suppose he would. I wish people were born without tempers.”
“’Twould be a fine thing,” assented the housemaid, recalling some occasions when Miss Lucy had been a little “sharp” herself.