Mr. Bettyman remained some time absent, and we still sat on the piazza, discussing Col. Robinson and the bad habit of borrowing rockaways. But when he returned, oh, angels and ministers of grace! he had mounted his hobby. Holding in his hand a spoon and tumbler he approached his wife.
“Now, Josy, my dear, where do you think I discovered these? Such unheard of carelessness! You see, my love, how I am forced to take care of every thing.”
Josy arose and laid the keys at his feet. “You have earned the honor at last, Edwin, and now you are my housekeeper, I am no longer responsible for any carelessness of the servants, and you are free from further anxiety, as you will direct and take the government of the whole concern.”
“And as the spoon is mine, and he has obliged me by throwing out the gum arabic which had all day been dissolving, that I might make Josy some mixture for her cough, I must beg him to replace every thing upon my window seat as he found it. I can have you taken up for purloining silver, Cousin Edwin; look at the mark now.”
Poor Mr. Bettyman! I could not but pity him, amusing as his mania was. In the morning early, the servants were again calling upon him for orders, and getting blessed at each new disturbance. In pity, then, I took the keys myself. But, called away shortly after, had to resign them into his unwilling hands. He took them with a woful countenance. “Ah, Ellen! you were my only friend, and now you desert me.”
When I next visited the house, it was to congratulate Joey upon the birth of a dear little girl; and Edwin was busy amid stew-pans and pap-cups, enraging the nurse until she vowed to leave the house unless allowed her own way with mother and child.
“Make slops for yourself and go to bed and swallow them, Mr. Bettyman, but indeed I will not poison the baby with your mixtures. Nor can I allow your lady, sir, to drink that mess you’ve been cooking half the day.”
Nurses are privileged people, and poor Edwin had to surrender. Josy’s grateful smiles, however, were some consolation, and the lovely babe another. I inquired of Isabel how long he kept the keys.
“Until Josephine’s confinement,” was her reply. “I was determined to give him a hard lesson; and never was man more ruffled than he. However, my dear, don’t think he is cured! By no means; he comes to me constantly as he did formerly to Josy; but I pay no attention to him, except by offering him again the housekeeping. He shall never annoy Josy again, depend upon it. The baby is enough occupation for her now, and Cousin Edwin stands enough in awe of me to let me have my way about every thing. He will meddle, and he may, but to no purpose.”
“And when you leave them, Isabel?”