“Oh, ma’am, do, please; it’s very particular.”
“Nonsense, cook,” I said; “you’ve been out twice this week. You only want to see your young man, and I can’t have it. You’re making yourself ridiculous over him, and neglecting your work. Go back to the kitchen at once.”
“Oh, then, you won’t let me go?” she said, turning fiery red.
“No. I’ve told you so.”
“Oh, that’s it, is it?” she said. “That’s your fellow-feeling for servants, is it? But it ain’t the sort of stuff you put in your ‘Memoirs.’”
“My what?” I gasped.
“Your ‘Memoirs’! Oh, you know what I mean, Miss Mary Jane Buffham. You’re a nice one to stick up for the poor servants, you are! Why don’t you practise what you preach?”
I never was so insulted in my life. It was all my work to prevent myself taking that woman by the shoulders and shaking her—the idea of her daring to throw my “Memoirs” in my face—my own servant, too!
But I kept my temper, and I said quietly, “Cook, you forget yourself.”
“No, I don’t,” she said, with an exasperating leer. “It’s you that forget yourself. You’re a missus now, but you weren’t always, and when you weren’t, you could reckon missuses up as well as anybody.”