I am afraid that as this account of the doings of our three friends unfolds itself, some of my readers may be tempted to complain that it seems to be always meal-time at "The Rowans." Indeed, I must admit that from their point of view the complaint is a just one, but I would beg them to remember that my object is to give an account of the culinary doings of the household; their meals, and how they were contrived, and the cost thereof; and as, like the old woman in the nursery song,
"Victuals and drink were the chief of their diet,"
the food question must perforce be continually before us.
As a girl of fourteen I had to take the reins of government and direct the house during my mother's long illness. It would certainly have helped me greatly to have been able to follow the chronicles of some young housekeeper and to have learnt how she arranged matters. But at that time Marion and the Orlingburys were all in short frocks and had no experiences to unfold for my benefit.
The trials of the members of our household during the time of my rule were doubtless very severe. The chief thing that I remember is that my favourite sultana pudding was served about four times a week, with sauce; on the last point I was most particular.
I had always a great longing to go down in the kitchen and cook myself, but my father forbade this, saying that if I worried the cook she would probably give warning; and that, if in addition to my mother's illness and other present ills (of which I fear my housekeeping was one) we were left without a cook, he should not know what to do. This was a sore disappointment, for as yet I had never been able to make any attempt at cooking, except on one occasion, when at the age of six I had been discovered surreptitiously frying chocolate creams on the shovel in the dining-room, for which I was sent to bed. At a yet earlier period, having heard somewhere that toffee was made with butter and sugar, I put a small pat of butter and a tablespoonful of sugar into an empty sweet-box, and, hiding it amongst my toys, waited with anxiety for it to turn into toffee, looking in the box with keen interest every morning and hoping for the joyful day when the sticky mess should become a neat brown slab of finest toffee; a day, alas, which came not, as was not strange, and the end of it was that the nurse found the hidden treasure and promptly threw it away.
To come back to "The Rowans," where Marion, having finished her morning's cooking, is reading a letter in the sitting-room. The letter is from an old playmate, now grown up and lately married, who is living on the other side of London.
"Tulse Hill,
"Jan. 10th.
"My dear Marion,—Do not look for any interesting news in this letter, and make up your mind to exercise all your good nature.