“When is your waitress’ month up?”
“On the fifteenth.”
“This is the seventh. Pay her a week’s wages to-morrow and pack her off. I will have none of that woman’s spies in my house—that is, always supposing it to be mine. I understand this afternoon’s scene. She is kept posted as to the status of domestic affairs.”
“You are out of humor, Barton, or you could not be so unjust to me and to a faithful servant.”
Griselda would not have retorted in a hard, cutting tone, but Griselda could neither read nor write. Diffusion of knowledge has a tendency to breed sedition among the lower orders.
Clubs for the lofty, and lager beer saloons for the lowly, stand, with controversial Benedicks, for the “refuges” foreign cities offer to the fugitive from wheels and hoofs.
“Excuse me for leaving you to digest your dinner and the memory of that last remark in solitude,” Barton said sardonically. “I shall finish my dinner at the club.”
The library was the coziest room in the house. Before Mr. Rowland called, Agnes had looked into it to see that the fire was bright and that Barton’s easy-chair, newspaper, and cigar-stand were in place. Upon the table was a bowl of Bon Silène roses he had ordered on his way downtown that morning. She had poured out his coffee and lighted his cigar here for him last night. It all rushed over her with the pure deliciousness of the roses’ breath, as she returned to the deserted apartment after dinner. As she moved, the fragrance broke into waves that overwhelmed her with the sweet agony of associativeness.
Sinking upon her knees before her husband’s chair, she laid her head within her enfolding arms and remained thus until the clock struck nine. Then she spoke aloud:
“What has he given me in exchange for my beautiful ideal world and for my work? A drugged cup, with gall and wormwood in the bottom.”