"Take her!" repeated Mrs. Tolbridge, with some irritation. "What could I do with a woman like that? She would want enormous wages. She would have to have kitchen maids, and I know not whom, besides, to wait on her; and as for our plain style of living, she could not be expected to stand that. She would be entirely out of place in a house like this."
"Her looks were enough to settle her case," said Dora. "You never saw such an old witch; she would frighten the horses."
"Kitty Tolbridge," said Miss Panney, severely, "did you ask that woman if she wanted high wages, if she required kitchen maids, if she would be satisfied to cook for your family?"
"No, I didn't," said the other; "I knew it was of no use. It was plain to see that she would not do at all."
"Did you get her address?"
"Yes," said Dora; "she gave me a card as we were going out, and insisted on my taking it. It is in my bag at home."
Miss Panney was silent for a moment, and was evidently endeavoring to cool her feelings so as to speak without indignation.
"Kitty Tolbridge," she said presently, "I think you have deliberately turned your back on one of the greatest opportunities ever offered to a woman with a valuable husband. There are husbands who have no value, and who might as well be hurried to their graves by indigestion as in any other way, but the doctor is not one of these. Now, whatever you know of that woman proves her to be the very person who should be in your kitchen at this moment; and whatever you have said against her is all the result of your imagination. If I were in your place, I would take the next train for the city; and before I closed my eyes this night, I would know whether or not such a prize as that were in my reach. I say prize because I never heard of such a chance being offered to a doctor's wife in a country town. Now what are you going to do about it, Kitty? If your regard for your husband's physical condition is not sufficient to make you look on this matter as I do, think of his soul. If you don't believe that true religion and good cooking go hand in hand, wait a year and then see what sort of a husband you will have."
Mrs. Tolbridge felt that she ought to resent this speech, that she ought to be, at least, a little angry; but when she was a small girl, Miss Panney was an old woman who sometimes used to scold her. She had not minded the scoldings very much then, and she could not bring herself to mind this scolding very much now. Occasionally she had scolded Miss Panney, and the old lady had never been angry.
"I shall not go to the city," she said, with a smile; "but I will write, and ask all the questions. Then our consciences will be easier."