"Oh, yes, I like it here. I would have liked to stay."
"Well, Miss Merry, how'd you like to stay and help me?" said the landlady. "To tell the truth, I've bit off more than I can chew, as they say. I never had such a run of boarders, and it's all the girl can do to look after the other house. What keeps my people is the cooking, you see, and that I do mostly myself. I'm not fit to talk to the ladies and gentlemen, with my hair all stringy, and smelling of cooking. I know it well enough. I had some thought of asking Mrs. Meeker to go in with me and look after this house and take the head of the table, and keep the books. But you could do it, if you wanted, and you'd look more—more—not that Mrs. Meeker wasn't a lady, of course, but—well, some people look the part better than others."
Miss Mary's brain whirled. The head of the table! The books! It was impossible. Why, the woman didn't realise that she was talking to a—a—Patient, then! (They were never called anything but Patients at Dr. Jarvyse's.)
"I—I'm afraid I haven't the experience," she began tremulously. "I—sometimes my head—I can't always talk to people——"
"Oh, you talk enough," Mrs. Palmer interrupted, kindly. "That's just what it is: some talk too much. Mr. Swartout (that's the literary gentleman in brown—the one with the grey moustache) said you were so quiet and dignified. You know you sat at the end, today, for breakfast, and he said to me it would be pleasant if you kept that place. That's what put it into my head, really. And I guess you've had experience enough. Miss Jenny, that went with you through the store when you bought those clothes (I know her, you see) said she'd never seen seventy dollars used with more judgment nor made to go further. I noticed what she said." She nodded shrewdly, as one who knew the world.
"Well, I don't want to urge, but will you or won't you? I'd give board and lodging and, say, twenty-five a month, till I could do better. The Palmer House has just got to the point where there'll have to be a change, or it'll get second-class."
"Very well, I will try," said Miss Mary huskily, and in a moment she was alone, for Mrs. Palmer was half across the side-yard.
"Just boss that woman, then, and see if she can get the house clean by evening," she called over her shoulder. "I leave her to you, Miss Merry, and it's a weight off me, I can tell you!"
If Miss Mary had paused to think, she would have collapsed into tears and sent for the doctor, but she could not stop, for the cleaning-woman addressed her briskly.
"I suppose everything better come right out and get a good beating?" she said, shouldering her mop; and Miss Mary controlled her quivering lips, pressed her hands to her head, which must not, could not fail her now, and agreed.