"I thought you was never coming," was Sarah's salutation. "Goodness knows, I have enough to do in my own house, and for my own people, not to be kept dancin' all these hours in attendance, because others find time for makin' fools of themselves. Now, I hope I shall not be wanted longer. My man needs his meals as much as others, and if he don't get 'em reglar, who suffers but I? Dooty begins at home. You might have had more consideration, and come earlier, Jonas."
The woman accorded to Mehetabel but a surly greeting. The young bride entered the house. A single tallow dip was burning on the table, with a long dock to it, unsnuffed. The hearth was cold.
"I didn't light a fire," said Mrs. Rocliffe; "you see it wouldn't do. Now you have come as mistress, it's your place to light the fire on the hearth. I've heard tell it's unlucky for any other body to do it. Not as I knows." She shrugged her shoulders. It seemed that this was a mere excuse put forward to disguise her indolence, or to veil her malevolence.
Mehetabel looked around her.
There were no plates. There was nothing to eat prepared on the kitchen table. No cloth; nothing whatever there, save the guttering candle.
"I didn't lay out nuthin'," said Mrs. Rocliffe; "you see, how was I to say you'd want vittles? I suppose you have had as much as is good for you away where you come from—at the Ship. If you are hungry—there's cold rabbit pie in the larder, if it ain't gone bad. This weather has been bad for keepin' meat. There's bread in the larder, if you don't mind the rats and mice havin' been at it. That's not my fault. Jonas, he had some for his break'us, and never covered up the pan, so the varmin have got to it. There's ale, too, in a barrel, I know, but Jonas keeps the key to that lest I should take a sup. He begrudges me that, and expects me to work for him like a galley-slave."
Then the woman was silent, looking moodily down. The floor was strewn with flakes of whitewash as though snow had fallen over it.
"You see," said Mrs. Rocliffe, "Jonas would go to the expense of whitenin' the ceilin', just because you was comin.' It had done plenty well for father and mother, and I don't mind any time it were whitened afore, and I be some years the elder of Jonas. The ceiling was that greasy wi' smoke, that the whitewashin' as it dried 'as pealed off, and came down just about. You look up—the ceilin' is ten times worse than afore. It looks as if it were measly. I wouldn't sweep up the flakes as fell off just to let Jonas see what comes of his foolishness. I told him it would be so, but he wouldn't believe me, and now let him see for himself—there it is."
With a sort of malignant delight the woman observed Mehetabel, and saw how troubled and unhappy she was.
Again a stillness ensued. Mehetabel could hear her heart beat. She could hear no other sound. She looked through the room towards the clock. It was silent.