"This the sitting-room! Do you call this furnished?"
"Don't be hasty, Dobbs," rebuked her mistress. "Hear what the lady has to say."
"The furniture is homely, certainly," acknowledged Jane. "But it is new and clean. That is a most comfortable sofa. The bedrooms are above."
The old lady said she would see them, and they proceeded upstairs. Dobbs put her head into one room, and withdrew it with a shriek. "This room has no bedside carpets."
"I am sorry to say that I have no bedside carpets at present," said Jane, feeling all the discouragement of the avowal. "I will get some as soon as I possibly can, if any one taking the rooms will kindly do without them for a little while."
"Perhaps we might, Dobbs," suggested the old lady, who appeared to be of an accommodating, easy nature; readily satisfied.
"Begging your pardon, ma'am, you'll do nothing of the sort," returned Dobbs. "We should have you doubled up with cramp, if you clapped your feet on to a cold floor. I am not going to do it."
"I never do have cramp, Dobbs."
"Which is no reason, ma'am, why you never should," authoritatively returned Dobbs.
"What a lovely view from these back windows!" exclaimed the old lady. "Dobbs, do you see the Malvern Hills?"