“I really don't know. It depends so much on the boys and the housemaid. I mean the housemaid's given notice, you know, because I had to speak to her about breathing when handing round the vegetables; and she gave notice on the spot, as they all do when I speak to them, and unless I can get another, I really don't think I shall ever be able to get away.”
“Really, what servants are coming to!” Mrs. Dormer was struggling with her collar like a dog. “Poor Mrs. Comber, I am so sorry—of course management's the thing, but we haven't all the gift and can't expect to have it.”
“And Mrs. Dormer, I do hope that you are going to be here over Christmas, so that we can keep each other company. It would be so nice if you and Mr. Dormer would come to us on Boxing evening, even if I have n't got a housemaid, and I heard of a very likely one from Mrs. Rose yesterday—quite a nice girl she sounded—who's been under-parlormaid at Colonel Forster's now for the last five years, and never a fault to find with her except a tendency to catching cold, which made her sniff at times.”
“Oh, thank you, dear Mrs. Comber; but my husband and I are hoping to spend a few days in London about that time. Otherwise we should have loved—”
For so much charity is the presence of Sir Marmaduke Boniface responsible.
II.
Sir Marmaduke, and all that his coming signified, was also responsible for clearing the air in other directions. Young Traill found, on this morning, that people were very much pleasanter to him than they had hitherto been. The coming holidays were obviously to be a truce, and, as he was not returning next term, it was an end of things so far as he was concerned. He could not feel proud of it all. The events of the term had shown him that he was not nearly so fine a fellow as he had thought himself. His pride, his temper, his irritation—all these things were lions with which he had never fought before: now they must always, for the future, be consciously kept in check.
He was tired, exhausted, worn-out. He was very glad that he was going away—now he would be able to have Isabel to himself, and they might, together, forget this horrible nightmare of a term. He looked on the buildings of Moffatt's as the iron prison of some hideous dream. He could not sleep for the thought of it. Last night he had had some bad dream... he could not remember now what it had been, but he had wakened suddenly in a great panic, to imagine that someone was closing his door. Of course it had only been the wind, but he hoped that he would sleep properly to-night.
At any rate he was glad that people were going to be pleasant to him on this last day of the term. The stout Miss Madder, Dormer, Clinton—they all seemed to be sorry that he was going, in spite of all the trouble that he had made. He did not think of Perrin....
Then he suddenly remembered Birkland. He would go and say good-by to him.