No, of course not! Why should she? etc.
Well, they hunted high and they hunted low, and the church bell gave its final peremptory clang when they were still hunting, but no leg of mutton was found either in the master’s boot cupboard, or under the bed in the spare room, or in the bookcase in the library, or in the woodshed, or in any other of the equally likely places which they searched. Indeed, no one had ever expected that it would be found once its absence was discovered; they just looked darkly at each other and murmured, “That Esmeralda, of course.” Cook declares that her mistress added “the good-for-nothing baggage” under her breath; but I can’t credit that of Miss Bretherton, who always manages to maintain a wonderful calm and self-restraint under the most trying circumstances.
At any rate, she told cook they must have fried ham and eggs for dinner—if you ever heard of such a thing on a Sunday at the rectory! and the Archdeacon of Saskatchewan preaching in the morning on behalf of the C.M.S. too!
Moreover, Miss Bretherton was ten minutes late for church, a thing never known before in the memory of the oldest inhabitant; and then, still more remarkable, instead of waiting to speak to people after church, she set off at a terrific pace for Mrs. Price’s cottage, and walked in to find the kitchen full of a delightful aroma, and a fine leg of mutton just being taken from the roasting-jack by Esmeralda and placed on the table, which was already adorned with a saucer containing pickled walnuts.
Miss Bretherton knew better than to say, “That’s my leg of mutton.” Our village understands all about “having the law on ’un,” if anyone upsets their feelings in any way. Therefore, swallowing hard, and determining for the hundredth time not to lose her temper, she said, “Where did you get that leg of mutton from, Mrs. Price?”
Had the woman replied, “From the butcher,” that would have been fairly incriminating, because, of course, we don’t require more than one sheep a week for home consumption in the village, and, as everybody knows, each sheep has only two legs, and it wouldn’t require a Sherlock Holmes to track those two legs any week in the year. As it happened, this week’s other leg had gone to my house. Had Mrs. Price claimed it as her own, she would have been undone.
But she was too shrewd for that; she promptly replied, with a look of surprised innocence at such a strange question being asked by Miss Bretherton at such a time—
“That leg of mutton, do you mean, miss?” (as though there was a meat market to choose from!) “Yes; ain’t it a fine one; it weighs seven pound, if it weighs an ounce.” (Miss B. knew that; she had studied the butcher’s ticket only that morning.) “I couldn’t get it into the oven, so we had to roast it afore the fire. I expect you find the kitchen a bit ’ot. But as I was saying” (Miss B. had to press her lips together very hard), “it ain’t often as I get a windfall like this, but my brother-in-law come up to see us yesterday from Penglyn, and he brought it me for a birthday present; that’s why I had to send ’Sm’ralder round to the rectory in the afternoon to fetch my pudding basin as she’d left behind—the one she brought round that day with some new-laid eggs in, what I give her for a present for cook’s mother who were bad.”
Miss Bretherton pressed her lips still tighter, and walked out. She knew the brother-in-law wouldn’t speak to “that Jane” if he met her in the same lane—such was the love between the two families—much less bring her a leg of mutton; besides, he had none too many joints for his own family. She also knew that cook’s mother had not been ill, and if she had, it wouldn’t have been Mrs. Price who would have supplied the new-laid eggs.