Thankful repeated this astonishing conversation, or part of it, to Emily. The latter considered it a good joke. “That girl is a strange creature,” she said, “and great fun. You never can tell what she will say or think. She is very romantic and that nonsense about duty and the rest of it undoubtedly is taken from some story she has read. You needn't worry, Auntie. Imogene worships you, and she will never leave you—to be married, or for any other reason.”
So Thankful did not worry about Imogene. She had other worries, those connected with a houseful of boarders, and these were quite sufficient. And now came another. Kenelm Parker was threatening to leave her employ.
The statement is not strictly true. Kenelm, himself, never threatened to do anything. But another person did the threatening for him and that person was his sister. Hannah Parker, for some unaccountable reason, seemed to be developing a marked prejudice against the High Cliff House. Her visits to the premises were not less frequent than formerly, but they were confined to the yard and stable; she no longer called at the house. Her manner toward Emily and Thankful was cordial enough perhaps, but there was constraint in it and she asked a good many questions concerning her brother's hours of labor, what he did during the day, and the like.
“She acts awful queer, seems to me,” said Thankful. “Not the way she did at first at all. In the beginnin' I had to plan pretty well to keep her from runnin' in and sp'ilin' my whole mornin' with her talk. Now she seems to be keepin' out of my way. What we've done to make her act so I can't see, and neither can Emily.”
Captain Bangs, to whom this remark was addressed, laughed.
“You ain't done anything, I guess,” he said. “It ain't you she's down on; it's your hired girl, the Imogene one. She seems to be more down on that Imogene than a bow anchor on a mud flat. They don't hitch horses, those two. You see she tries to boss and condescend and Imogene gives her as good as she sends. It's got so that Hannah is actually scared of that girl; don't pretend to be, of course; calls her 'the inmate' and all sorts of names. But she is scared of her and don't like her.”
Thankful was troubled. “I'm sorry,” she said. “Imogene is independent, but she's an awful kind-hearted girl. I do hate trouble amongst neighbors.”
“Oh, there won't be any trouble. Hannah's jealous, that's all the trouble—jealous about Kenelm. You see, she wanted him to come here to work so's she could have him under her thumb and run over and give him orders every few minutes. Imogene gives him orders, too, and he minds; she makes him. Hannah don't like that; 'cordin' to her notion Kenelm hadn't ought to have any skipper but her. It's all right, though, Mrs. Barnes. It's good for Kenelm and it's good for Hannah. Do 'em both good, I cal'late.”
But when Kenelm announced that he wasn't sure but that he should “heave up his job” in a fortnight or so, the situation became more serious.
“He mustn't leave,” declared Thankful. “August and early September are the times when I've got to have a man on the place, and you say yourself, Captain Bangs, that there isn't another man to be had just now. If he goes—”