"Indeed, your grace, I know that I am fortunate, and that there are many that would envy me."
"Then don't talk any more nonsense. What do I pay you? A hundred and twenty pounds a year, isn't it? Well, then, take another twenty pounds. Now go and arrange the orchids."
"I am very sorry, your grace," Proctor said. "But I do not seek any increase of wages. I respectfully ask you to accept my month's notice."
A certain firmness and determination had come into the valet's voice. It irritated the duke. It was a note to which he was not accustomed. But he tried to keep his temper.
"What are your reasons for wishing to leave me?" he said, asking the direct question for the first time.
"I have been successful with a small invention, your grace. I occupy my spare time with mechanics. It is an improved lock and key, and a firm have taken it up."
"Have they paid you?" said the duke.
"A certain sum down, your grace, and a royalty is to follow on future sales."
"I congratulate you, I'm sure," the duke said, with an unconsciously contemptuous smile, for he shared the not uncommon opinion among certain people that there is something ludicrous in the originality of a servant. "No idea you were such a clever fellow. But I don't see why you should want to leave me. Because you are my servant it won't interfere with you collecting your royalties or whatever they are."
The duke was a kind-hearted young man enough. He did not mean to wound his valet, but he had never been accustomed to think of such people as quite human—human in the sense that he himself was human—and his tone was far more unpleasant than he had any idea of.