“Oh! we want to buy a lot of things, Baboo!” said Mr. Browne, familiarly, “at half your regular prices, and a large discount for cash! What have you got? Got any chairs?”
“Oh yess indeed; certainlee! Will you please to come this way?”
“This way” led through a labyrinth of furniture, new and old, of glass and crockery and chipped ornaments, a dusty haven of dismayed household gods. “What have you got in there, Baboo?” asked young Browne, as they passed an almirah revealing rows of tins and labels.
“Stores, sir,—verree best qualitty stores. You can see fo’ you’self, sir—Crosse an’ Blackwell——”
“Oh yes, Baboo! And how long did you say they’d been there?”
“Onlee one month, sir,” the baboo replied, attempting an expression of surprise and injury. “I can tell you the name of the ship they arrived in, sir.”
“Of course you can, Baboo. But never mind. We don’t want any to-day. Let’s see the chairs. Now, Helen,” he continued, as the baboo went on in advance, “you see what we are subject to in this ungodly place. Those pease and gooseberries and asparaguses have probably been in Calcutta a good deal longer than I have. They look like old sojourners; I wouldn’t give them a day under six years. They are doubtless very cheap, but think, Helen, of what might happen to my inside if you gave me green pease out of Bow Bazar!” Mrs. Browne looked aghast. “But I never will, George!” said she, solemnly. And young Browne made her vow it there and then. “There are two or three decent European shops here,” he said, with unction, “where they make a point of not poisoning more people than they can help. You pay rather largely for that comfortable assurance, I believe, but it’s worth having. I’d have more faith in the stability of the family, Helen, if you would promise always to go to them for tinned things.”
Helen promised effusively, and it is to her credit that she always informed young Browne, before consumption, whenever a domestic exigency made her break her word.
They climbed up a dark and winding stair that led out upon a flat roof, crossed the roof and entered a small room, borrowed from the premises of some other baboo. “Hold your skirts well up, Helen; it’s just the place for centipedes,” her husband remarked callously; and Mrs. Browne exhibited a disregard for her ankles that would have been remarkable under any other circumstances.
