"Now this is the very young woman we want!" he said. "I've always said from the very beginning that I'd have naught but what was first-class. I shall send this here young person my references, agree to her terms, and tell her to start out as soon as she can."
"I'm afraid she's rather expensive, love," murmured Mrs. Dennison.
"I'm not to a few pounds one way or another," answered Matthew. "I'm one of them that believe in doing a thing right when you do do it. Last two years with a countess—what? What'd suit a countess 'll suit me. William Henry, you can get out the writing-desk, and we'll draw up a letter to this young woman at once."
William Henry, who had little or no interest in the model dairy, and regarded it as no more and no less than a harmless fad of his father's, complied with this request, and spent half-an-hour in writing an elegant epistle after the fashion of those which he had been taught to compose at the boarding-school where he had received his education. After that he gave no more thought to the dairymaid, being much more concerned in managing the farm, and in an occasional day's hunting and shooting, than in matters outside his sphere. But about a week later his father opened a letter at the breakfast-table, and uttered a gratified exclamation.
"Now, the young woman's coming to-day," he announced. "She'll be at Marltree station at precisely four-thirty. Of course somebody'll have to drive over and meet her, and that somebody can't be me, because I've a meeting of the Guardians at Cornborough at that very hour. William Henry, you must drive the dog-cart over."
William Henry was not too pleased with the idea, for he had meant to go fishing. But he remembered that he could go fishing every afternoon if it pleased him, and he acquiesced.
"I've been wondering, Matthew," said Mrs. Dennison, who was perusing the letter through her spectacles; "I've been wondering where to put this young person. You can see from her writing that she's of a better sort—there's no common persons as writes and expresses themselves in that style. I'm sure she'll not want to have her meals with the men and the gels in the kitchen, and of course we can't bring her among ourselves, as it were."
Matthew scratched his head.
"Deng my buttons!" he said. "I never thought o' that there! Of course she'll be what they call a sort of upper servant, such as the quality have. Aye, for sure! Well, let's see now—I'll tell ye what to do, missis. Let her have the little parlour—we scarce ever use it—for her own sitting-room, and she can eat there. That's the sensiblest arrangement that I can think on. Then we shall all preserve our various ranks. What do ye say, William Henry?"
William Henry said that he was agreeable to anything, and proceeded to make his usual hearty breakfast. He thought no more of his afternoon expedition until the time for setting out came, and then he had the brown mare harnessed to a smart dog-cart, and set off along the roads for Marltree, five miles away. It was a pleasant afternoon in early April, and the land had the springtide's new warmth on it. And William Henry thought how happy he would have been with his fishing-rod.