“Tell all you like. I don’t mind madam. She’ll have leisure to digest it against the pater returns.”
I wrote a long letter, and told everything, going into the minute details that she liked to hear, about the servants, and all else. Rose Lodge was the most wonderful bargain, I said, and we were both as happy as the days were long.
The church was a little primitive edifice near the sands. We went to service on Sunday morning; and upon getting home afterwards, found the cloth not laid. Tod had ordered dinner to be on the table. He sent me to the kitchen to blow up Betty.
“It is quite ready and waiting to be served; but I can’t find a clean tablecloth,” said Betty.
“Why, I told you where the tablecloths were,” shouted Tod, who heard the answer. “In the cupboard at the top of the stairs.”
“But there are no tablecloths there, sir,” cried she. “Nor anything else either, except a towel or two.”
Tod went upstairs in a passion, bidding her follow him, and flung the cupboard door open. He thought she had looked in the wrong place.
But Betty was right. With the exception of two or three old towels and some stacks of newspapers, the cupboard was empty.
“By Jove!” cried Tod. “Johnny, that grenadier must have walked off with all the linen!”
Whether she had, or had not, none to speak of could be found now. Tod talked of sending the police after her, and wrote an account of her delinquencies to Captain Copperas, addressing the letter to the captain’s brokers in Liverpool.