"Father was bound he wouldn't," her sister wrote her; "but I stood right up to him, I can now I'm married!--and Gerald too--that he'd no right to take it out of mother even if he was mad with you.He made a fuss about your paying for the girl--but that was only showing off--_he_ couldn't pay for her just now--that's certain.And she does very well--a good strong girl, and quite devoted to mother." And then she scolded furiously about her sister's "working out."Diantha knew just how hard it was for her mother.She had faced all sides of the question before deciding.
"Your mother misses you badly, of course," Ross wrote her."I go in as often as I can and cheer her up a bit.It's not just the work--she misses you.By the way--so do I." He expressed his views on her new employment.
Diantha used to cry over her letters quite often.But she would put them away, dry her eyes, and work on at the plans she was maturing, with grim courage."It's hard on them now," she would say to herself."Its hard on me--some.But we'll all be better off because of it, and not only us--but everybody!"Meanwhile the happy and unhappy households of the fair town buzzed in comment and grew green with envy.
In social circles and church circles and club circles, as also in domestic circles, it was noised abroad that Mrs.Edgar Porne had "solved the servant question." News of this marvel of efficiency and propriety was discussed in every household, and not only so but in barber-shops and other downtown meeting places mentioned.Servants gathered it at dinner-tables; and Diantha, much amused, regathered it from her new friends among the servants.
Does she keep on just the same?" asked little Mrs.Ree of Mrs.Porne in an awed whisper.
"Just the same if not better.I don't even order the meals now, unless I want something especial.She keeps a calendar of what we've had to eat, and what belongs to the time of year, prices and things.When Iused to ask her to suggest (one does, you know: it is so hard to think up a variety!), she'd always be ready with an idea, or remind me that we had had so and so two days before, till I asked her if she'd like to order, and she said she'd be willing to try, and now I just sit down to the table without knowing what's going to be there.""But I should think that would interfere with your sense of freedom,"said Mrs.Ellen A Dankshire, "A woman should be mistress of her own household.""Why I am! I order whenever I specially want anything.But she really does it more--more scientifically.She has made a study of it.And the bills are very much lower.""Well, I think you are the luckiest woman alive!" sighed Mrs.Ree."Iwish I had her!"
Many a woman wished she had her, and some, calling when they knew Mrs.
Porne was out, or descending into their own kitchens of an evening when the strange Miss Bell was visiting "the help," made flattering propositions to her to come to them.She was perfectly polite and agreeable in manner, but refused all blandishments.
"What are you getting at your present place--if I may ask?" loftily inquired the great Mrs.Thaddler, ponderous and beaded.
"There is surely no objection to your asking, madam," she replied politely."Mrs.Porne will not mind telling you, I am sure.""Hm!" said the patronizing visitor, regarding her through her lorgnette.
"Very good.Whatever it is I'll double it.When can you come?""My engagement with Mrs.Porne is for six months," Diantha answered, "and I do not wish to close with anyone else until that time is up.
Thank you for your offer just the same."
"Peculiarly offensive young person!" said Mrs.Thaddler to her husband.
"Looks to me like one of these literary imposters.Mrs.Porne will probably appear in the magazines before long."Mr.Thaddler instantly conceived a liking for the young person, "sight unseen."Diantha acquired quite a list of offers; places open to her as soon as she was free; at prices from her present seven dollars up to the proposed doubling.
"Fourteen dollars a week and found!--that's not so bad," she meditated.
"That would mean over $650 clear in a year! It's a wonder to me girls don't try it long enough to get a start at something else.With even two or three hundred ahead--and an outfit--it would be easier to make good in a store or any other way.Well--I have other fish to fry!"So she pursued her way; and, with Mrs.Porne's permission--held a sort of girl's club in her spotless kitchen one evening a week during the last three months of her engagement.It was a "Study and Amusement Club." She gave them short and interesting lessons in arithmetic, in simple dressmaking, in easy and thorough methods of housework.She gave them lists of books, referred them to articles in magazines, insidiously taught them to use the Public Library.
They played pleasant games in the second hour, and grew well acquainted.
To the eye or ear of any casual visitor it was the simplest and most natural affair, calculated to "elevate labor" and to make home happy.
Diantha studied and observed.They brought her their poor confidences, painfully similar.Always poverty--or they would not be there.Always ignorance, or they would not stay there.Then either incompetence in the work, or inability to hold their little earnings--or both; and further the Tale of the Other Side--the exactions and restrictions of the untrained mistresses they served; cases of withheld wages; cases of endless requirements; cases of most arbitrary interference with their receiving friends and "followers," or going out; and cases, common enough to be horrible, of insult they could only escape by leaving.
"It's no wages, of course--and no recommendation, when you leave like that--but what else can a girl do, if she's honest?"So Diantha learned, made friends and laid broad foundations.
The excellence of her cocking was known to many, thanks to the weekly "entertainments." No one refused.No one regretted acceptance.Never had Mrs.Porne enjoyed such a sense of social importance.
