“I don’t like to be unkind to poor Janet,” said Mrs Jared; “but I’m always in dread of something happening when Patty goes there.”
“Too-hoo, too-roo, roo-roo,” blew Jared from the half-cobbled instrument. “Hen’s anxiety about her chicks!”
“Chicks! yes;” said Mrs Jared with a sigh, her thought’s current turned. “It is such a drawback having so many children, as well as the anxiety; what with the doctor and the nurse, and dear, dear, the extravagance of the old things, it is really dreadful; and when I’m up-stairs and can’t help myself, I do so fidget about the expense. The tea that goes when Patty is not there is really infamous. I’m sure it’s never used. And when you buy black at three shillings, and green at four, Mr Timson’s best, it worries you terribly. If ever—you know what I mean—and I wanted one again poor Mrs Nimmer had promised to come, if I’d set her free on Saturdays for dusting, and, of course, on Sundays, and now she’s ill.”
From the wail which now arose from the clarionet it might have been supposed that Mrs Nimmer had been dead, but Jared did not speak.
“Oh, dear!” sighed Mrs Jared, “if we did not have so many children!”
“What’s the good of grumbling?” grunted Jared; and then there was silence, only broken by the clicking of needle against thimble.
“When was she taken ill?” said Mrs Jared then.
“What? Mrs Nimmer?—last week. Break up, I think. She’s past seventy.”
Mrs Jared sighed again, and then Jared took up the ball as he went on busily cleaning the keys of the instrument.
“Children are expensive luxuries. Costly; they do eat so furiously; and I don’t believe there ever were such children as ours to eat—bless ’em. Poor folks’ children ought to be born without appetites, instead of coming into the world with a double share. Some people do, I think, reckon the poor to be a different race to their noble selves; and if they are to be so looked on, it does seem a pity that Nature don’t take the matter up and cover them with feathers or wool. What a saving it would be if they’d only moult every year and come out in a new suit!”