“Then what are all these?” asked Mrs. Brand. “I thought this was the ‘general servants’ department.”
“So it is. But most of these are general servants ‘where another is kept.’ They would not go as a single hand,” explained the clerk.
“I must have one who will consent to do so,” said Lucy. Something in her low clear voice and simple decision of manner made the registry office clerk turn and look at her. This was not the style of mistress with whom she was best acquainted.
“I will try to please you, madam,” said the clerk. “I fear there is nobody suitable in the house at present. But one may come in at any moment. A great many girls do not appear till about noon. May I ask you to take a seat? There is a sofa vacant near the window.”
As the sisters took their seats on the shabby little sofa, two or three gaudy girls strolled past them, inspecting them from their hats down to their boots.
Lucy whispered—
“This puts me in mind of what we used to read about the slave marts in the States.”
“Yes, only it is the employers who are now on view!” said Florence snappily.
“I don’t know whether that makes it either worse—or better,” Lucy answered, drawing Hugh closer to her side.
The next moment a tall raw-boned woman with a forbidding countenance stepped up and bluntly asked,