CHAPTER V.
Mrs. Markham sat in her private parlor, comfortably sipping her tea. Whatever might be said of the children's bill of fare, there was nothing meager about hers. No Chinaman's tongue was ever a safer tea detector than Markham's. No spurious mixture found a place in her tea-caddy; no water-pot was allowed to wash away its strength when made. The warm biscuit were as fragrant as the tea, and the butter might have won the prize at any agricultural fair. The room too, in which the tea-table was spread, had every appliance for the consolation of a single woman. Comfortably plump sofas and chairs, a looking-glass, selected for its peculiar faculty of adding breadth to an unnecessarily elongated face; a handsome, well-filled bottle of Cologne, another of Bay Water, and a work-box, with all sorts of industrial appendages, the gift of Mr. Balch. Then, for the look of the thing, a few books, newspapers, pamphlets, etc., for Mrs. Markham never read; partly because she had a surfeit in the book line in the school-room, but principally, because publishers and editors had a sad way of making their types so indistinct now-a-days; or in other words, Markham had a strong aversion to spectacles.
There were no pictures or flowers in the room, because the former "marked the walls," and the latter "kept dropping their leaves on the carpet;" but there were two smart, gilt candelabras on the mantle, and a small clock between them, and an hour glass, and a stuffed owl. There was also a light kid glove, which always lay there, because it served for a text for Mr. Balch's little complimentary speeches about hands and hearts, and pairs, etc. Mrs. Markham was always going to put it away, but somehow she never did so.
"Ah, Timmins, is that you? come in. Is Tibbs any better," asked Mrs. Markham, comfortably sipping her tea.
"No ma'm, she's awful; her wrists look as if they would snap in two; and her neck looks so slender; and her head so big. Oh, she's a sight, ma'am."
"Pooh, you are always sight-seeing, Timmins; the child always had a miserable constitution. As the committee say, it is not much use to try to rear these children; the seeds of disease are in them."
"Well, Tibbs is going fast enough, that's certain. She's mostly stupid-like, but now and then she smiles and reaches out her arms, for all the world as if she saw the angels, and wanted them to come and take her."
"What nonsense, Timmins. Hand me that toast. Just as if a pauper-child would have such notions."