"What will you allow me for housekeeping, Mr. Thornycroft?" she asked in the morning.
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"Nothing," repeated the justice in his firmest tone, decisive as Richard's. She was taking her breakfast languidly in her room. It was eleven o'clock, but she had a headache, she said: the truth being that my lady liked to lie in bed. Mr. Thornycroft, coming in, condoled with her in his hearty manner, never believing but the plea was genuine--the straightforward country gentleman would as soon have believed Captain Copp's wooden leg to be a real one, as a headache false. He entered on the matter he came to speak of, the dinner of yesterday. Kindly enough, but very emphatically, he warned her that such a thing must not occur a second time. It had been altogether a mistake.
"Any money you may wish for yourself, for your own purposes, is yours heartily," he resumed; "but in the housekeeping you must not interfere. The cost is my care, and Sinnett sees to it: she has been in the house so long as to know perfectly well how to provide. I would have given ten pounds out of my pocket rather than have had that happen last night," added the justice, giving a flick to his trousers' right-hand pocket in momentary irritation at the recollection.
"But to provide such dinners is most unreasonable," she remonstrated. "It is only for the servants to eat. I don't think you can have an idea of the extravagance that goes on in the kitchen."
"Pooh! Extravagance! I can afford it. The servants only eat what goes down from our table; and what they can't eat is given away to those who want food. It was my father's plan before me, and it is mine."
"It is sinful waste," retorted my lady. "If you choose to sit down to an outrageously profuse table yourself, the servants ought not to follow suit."
"What would you have done with the superfluous victuals?" demanded the justice. "Put up for auction of a morning and sold?"
"As you ask me what I would have done, I will answer--do not provide them. The housekeeping is altogether on too liberal a scale."