"But, dear me!" said Laura, "I should think it would be ever so much nicer and handier to board. It will be such a bother, housekeeping and looking after servants, and all that kind of thing. If I were you I would board."
She turned upon Laura Blair, her eyes, her face, her voice, so passionate, that that young lady quite recoiled.
"Laura!" she cried out, in that passionate voice, "I must have a home. A home, do you hear, not a boarding-house. Heaven knows I have had enough of them to last me my life, and the sound of the word is hateful to me. I must have a home where I will be the mistress, free to do as I please, to come and go as I like, to receive my friends and go to them as it suits me, unasked and unquestioned. I must have a home of my own, or I shall die."
Mr. Darcy looked out a house for the heiress; and after a fortnight's search, found one to suit. It belonged to a certain major, who was going with his bride, a fair Speckportian, home to old England, on a prolonged leave of absence. It was to be let, all ready furnished; it was situated around the corner from Golden Row, commanding a fine view of the harbor, and with two most essential requisites, a garden and a stable. It was a pretty little cottage house, with a tiny drawing-room opening into a library, and a parlor opening into a dining-room. There was a wide hall between, with a delightful glass porch in front, a garden fronting the street, and the door at the other end of the hall opening into a grass-grown backyard. Altogether it was a pleasant little house, and Miss Henderson took it at once, as it stood, on the major's own terms, and made arrangements for removing there at once.
"I must have a horse, Laura, you know," she said to Miss Blair, as they inspected the cottage together, for the two girls had grown more and more intimate, with every passing day. "I must have a horse, and a man to take care of him; and besides, I shall feel safer with a man in the house. Then I must have a housekeeper, some nice motherly old lady, who will take all that trouble off my hands; and a chambermaid, who must be pretty, for one likes to have pretty things about one; and I shall get new curtains and pictures, and send to Boston for a piano and lots of music, and oh, Laura! I shall be just as happy as a queen here all day long."
She waltzed round the room where they were alone, in her new glee, for she was as fitful of temper as an April day—all things by turns, and nothing long. Laura, who was lolling back in a stuffed rocker, looked at her lazily. "A housekeeper, Olly! There's Mrs. Hill, that widow you told me once you thought had such a pleasant face. She is the widow of a pilot, and has no children. She lives with her brother-in-law, Mr. Clowrie, and would be glad of the place."
Miss Henderson gave a last whirl and wheeled breezily down upon a lounge.
"Would she? But perhaps she wouldn't suit. I want some one that can get up dinners, and oversee everything when I have a party. I must have a cook, too—I forgot that."
Laura laughed.
"If you went dinnerless one day, you would be apt to remember it afterward. Mrs. Hill is quite competent to a dinner, or any other emergency, for she was housekeeper in some very respectable English family, before she married that pilot. I am sure she would suit, and I know she would like to come."