They know the joy with which you fall on the missing sofa cushions when they are eventually discovered done up with spare bedding in the attic—that everyone has been too tired to undo; and the affectionate greetings bestowed on the hall clothes-brush when it is at length found—in company with the dog’s whip—in a drawer one has forgotten in a small table. Of course, it’s very satisfactory when the perspiring gentleman who has packed—and then unpacked again—all the china comes to announce, “Not a single piece is cracked or chipped, madam;” but when you survey the piles of crockery and glass on the kitchen dresser and table and window-ledge and mantelpiece, that haven’t yet found an abiding-place, and see the pantries full to overflowing, a lurking thought comes that perhaps it might have been an advantage if he had smashed a few dozens of the multitudinous array of cups and saucers and plates and dishes that seem woefully superfluous at the moment!
As there seemed a good bit still to do, I said I would dispense with the conventional “tour,” proper to the occasion, and spend the time trying to dispose of the twenty-seven British workmen, supposed to be house-decorating, who were cheerfully in possession (and apparently regarding their posts as life appointments) when our goods arrived at the door, despite our having let them live in the house rent free for two months previously.
It was a little difficult to follow their twenty-seven lines of argument as to why they should remain with us permanently, with Abigail continually at my elbow presenting a tradesman’s card and explaining—
“Please, ma’am, this man says he served the people who were here before; but I’ve told him he’s the ninth fishmonger who has said that to-day.”
Or else it would be, “There’s a man at the door says he served the last people with groceries. Can I tell him to run back and get some soap? I can’t find where the men put our packets, and it will be quicker than sending to the Stores. I suppose you don’t happen to have seen it, m’m? Cook and I have looked everywhere. But we’ve found the anchovy sauce, and the carpet beater. Where do you think they had packed them——” and so on.
But I determined to do my wifely duty in making a happy home for the man who had had the courage to marry me.
I was politely attentive when interviewed by a near-by magnate who was anxious to propose the Head of Affairs for the Conservative Club. I accepted particulars supplied me by the secretary of the Golf Club, who felt we were the very people the club needed. I tried to understand when the gardener explained the peculiarities of the greenhouse heating apparatus, and the danger that would threaten if anyone but himself entered the greenhouse.
I endured the postman knocking at the door a dozen times a day to inquire if we lived there, only to point out to us that we didn’t when we had assured him that we did. I informed the sweep that everything was quite satisfactory thank you, and I should hope to have the pleasure of meeting him again.
I accepted the coal man’s many reasons for not having delivered the coal sooner; and I thanked cook for the information that the policeman said he or his mate would always be on point duty at the corner whenever we wanted him.