we wanted Nellie for anything we found it easier to go to the back stairs and holler. It occurred to me that the electrician who had put in some new batteries the week before, for the front door bell, which before Elise came was dreadfully unreliable, must have monkeyed with the other bells too.
"Elise has rung for you," I said to Nellie, thankful with all my heart that the old thing had worked. I knew that Tom was already downstairs, so of course wasn't there to tell her that the old push-button didn't mean a thing, and I was glad of that. Heaven knew there was enough else to apologise for.
When Nellie came back I asked, "What did she want?"
"She wanted me to button up her waist and also to give me her laundry."
"Laundry!" gasped Delia. I never could understand why cooks hate washing so.
"Yes," I said, turning to her, "laundry! I told Mrs. Vars," I went on with much authority, "to put any soiled clothing she might have in a pink and blue bag which I made to match the guest-room, for this express purpose—for her to put her laundry in. That's only hospitality." I crossed the room. "And now you may put breakfast on, Delia," I finished, and went out.
After breakfast Nellie came to me and said, "Delia wishes to speak to you in the kitchen."
My heart sank. I left Elise in the sitting-room talking in her lovely soft way to Father and Alec. Delia was in the laundry standing by a regular haystack of lacy lingerie. She was holding up the most superb lace skirt I ever saw, rows upon rows of insertion and if you'll believe me made every inch by hand.
"I just wanted to say," she began, "that I don't stay if I have to wash these. They aren't dirty, in the first place, and what's more I'm not hired to wash company's clothes, and what's more I won't. And what's more still, I think you better hunt for another girl."
I couldn't have received more depressing news. I hated being ruled by a cook, and I hated to let her go. I didn't have a soul to ask about it. I didn't know what to do. I flared right up.
"The washing must be done," I said sternly. "That's settled."
Delia dropped the skirt.
"All right. I'll do the washing to-day," she announced, "and I'll leave to-morrow."
I just wanted to sit down and cry and cry and say, "O please be nice about it and help us out. Please stay! O please, please, please!" But I did no such thing. I bit my lip hard and replied, "Very well," and when I joined the others in the sitting-room, I was apparently as undisturbed as a summer's breeze.
Things got no better as time went on. Elise didn't fit into our family a bit. None of us was natural. Father didn't ring the gong when he came in at noon and call up to me, "Slippers, chicken"; the twins didn't fool under the tablecloth and call me "Snodgrass," "Angel" or "Trolley" (because of my shape); Alec didn't tilt back on the hind legs of his chair after dessert, with his hands shoved down in his pockets; Ruthie didn't practice a note on the piano; even Tom was different. At first he tried to whoop things up in the old Vars fashion, but he gave it up after an attempt or two. We wouldn't respond. We balked like stubborn horses, while all the time Elise kept right on being very sweet and charming, but, oh my, cold and far away.
Her tact got on my nerves. I realised that she was trying to be nice, but her appreciation of everything made me tired. Of course she had seen grander houses than ours and yet she pretended to enthuse over our old-fashioned mantels. "What fine woodwork in them," she'd say to Father, "and what beautiful mahogany in those sliding-doors!" or, as she gazed at our ornate black walnut bookcase, she would remark, "Black walnut is becoming so popular!" Once she exclaimed, "How many books you have!" and her eyes were resting on a row of black-bound town records Father insists on keeping. When she and I attempted a miserable game of croquet she remarked, "I think it is more fun having the ground a little uneven." Heavens, I would have loved her if she had blurted out, "Say, this is rotten! Let's not play." I despise insincerity.
CHAPTER III
ONE day at dinner (I've forgotten whether it was the first or second day of Elise's visit, but anyhow it was before the ice was broken) Father suggested that Tom take the new member of our family for a drive in the afternoon with Dixie (he and Alec, could go out to the factory by electrics), so as soon as Elise went upstairs to rest, as she always did after dinner, I escaped to the barn, to hitch up. Alec doesn't have much time to devote to Dixie and I gave that poor little animal such a currying as he had never had before in his life. Then I drew up the check two holes higher, dusted out the phaeton, and put in the best yellow plush robe and lash whip.
Elise and Tom got back about half-past six. I was in the sitting-room when Elise came into the house.
"Chenery has been showing me all the sights," she said. "I think Hilton is lovely. I told Chenery we were staying too long. I'm afraid we're late for dinner. But I'll hurry. It won't take me ten minutes to dress."
Dinner indeed! I wondered if she called the layout we had at noon just lunch. We've always had supper at night and I hadn't intended changing for Elise. But if she'd gone upstairs to dress for it, I'd got to prepare something besides tea, sliced meat and toast, for all the trouble she was taking. I flew to the kitchen. We had a can of beef-extract, and I told Delia to make soup out of that. Then I sent Ruth for some beefsteak, hauled down a can of peas for a vegetable, and the sliced oranges which were already prepared would have to do for dessert. I rushed to my room, put on my best light blue cashmere and laid out Ruth's white muslin.
It was, after all, on the first day of Elise's visit that she took that drive with Dixie, for this, I remember now, was the first evening meal that she had had with us. An awful catastrophe took place during the ordeal too. In the first place, having dinner at night added to the strain the family were all under, and it may have been due to the general atmosphere of uneasiness that made Nellie so stupid and careless. I don't know how it happened, but when she was passing the crackers to Elise, during the soup course, her cap got loose somehow and fell cafluke on Elise's bread-and-butter plate. There was an instant of dead quiet, and then Oliver, who just at that moment happened to have his mouth full of soup, exploded like a rubber ball with water in it. He shoved back his chair with a jerk, and coughing and choking into his napkin, got up and left the room. Of course that sent Malcolm off into a regular spasm, and little Ruth began to giggle too. I could feel myself growing as red as a beet, but I didn't laugh. No one laughed outright.
Elise was the first one to break the pause, and this is what she said:
"I've had the loveliest drive this afternoon," and then as no one replied she went on, "Chenery took me around the reservoir. How old are the ruins of that old mill at the upper end?"
Perhaps you think that that was a very graceful way of treating the situation, but I didn't. We were all simply dying to laugh. We couldn't think of old mills with that cap sticking on Elise's butter. However, I heard Father at the other end of the table making some sort of an answer to Elise, and all of us managed to control themselves somehow or other. Nellie, red in the face, carried the bread-and-butter plate away; Oliver sneaked back into his place; and I slowly began to cool off. But of course it spoiled the meal for me.
As soon after the horrible occurrence as possible, I escaped up here to my cupola, and Tom found me here before he went to bed. I knew he must be disappointed at the way I was running things. I hadn't been alone with him before, and when his head pushed up through the trap door and he asked, "You here?" I didn't answer. I was sitting in the
