“We are sorry,” said Mrs. Carson, and motioned her husband to be quiet.
Jasper evidently did not want to talk about the doctor’s visit, and she knew his man’s reserve.
“Do you think you ought to indulge your secretary?” she inquired after a few moments. “Since Miss Niven may feel the contrast afterwards, perhaps it really is not kind.”
“Miss Niven is not my secretary. She’s a stenographer I engaged for a time from a typewriting office. The time will soon be up, but I may be forced to ask if she will remain.”
“I expect she’ll agree! Her duties are light and the pay is generous.”
Jasper smiled. Mrs. Carson liked to rule, but at Netherhall she was entitled to do so, and where she meddled his habit was to banter her.
“I rather think Miss Niven’s pay helps to support two poor but remarkably respectable old people; but I don’t know if her duties are very light. She types my letters, reads the newspapers for me, and sometimes selected passages from popular novels. Miss Niven’s muse is tragic, but her reading’s spirited. Then she teaches me shorthand.”
“Is shorthand useful to you?” Mrs. Haigh inquired.
“So far, I admit it is not, because I cannot afterwards read the script, and Miss Niven is puzzled; but she states I make some progress. Then, when your nervous control is weak, to economize muscular effort helps, and shorthand’s advantage is that it is short. But I think I tried to justify my indulging my stenographer. You see, she’s a capable young woman and sternly conscientious. I imagine her only weaknesses are chocolate and sentimental novels, and to supply the articles is not a great extravagance.”
For a moment or two the others said nothing, but Jasper knew them interested, and their speculations excited his amusement. Perhaps they thought he pondered marrying his stenographer. Sometimes an infirm old man did marry a useful servant.