'Like different brands of poison,' Fred said.
'What's the motive?'
'His money.'
'And yet they're different,' Duff said. 'Do they all fit that motive?'
'In different ways.'
'Is that so, indeed?' EhifTs voice was warm and curious. 'Do you know them well?'
'I don't know them very well at all,' said Fred, 'but it don't take long to learn not to love 'em.'
'I shall have to learn,' said Duff. 'I think I'll stop over in the kitchen.'
'Alice and I ... I mean, Miss Brennan and I figured out a few things. We . . .'
'We'll talk about them,' Duff promised. 'But let me linger by the kitchen door now, before they wake.''
13
MacDougal Duff set himself to charm Josephine. He begged her hmnbly for a cup of coffee and would permit no fuss. He would drink it here, he said. Before long it became apparent that Mr. Duff was very much interested in the problems of a general houseworker from a new and fascinating point of view. Chat got around to the types of mistresses one drew. It seemed that Duff, in a broad, almost scientific kind of way, had made a study. People were fascinating, anyway. Aiid a houseworker's job was so bound up in himian relations. So much life to be lived on the job. Her boss made more difference to her, her boss's foibles, her boss's character. Josephine, drinking all this in, expanded when she found Duff ready to hang on her words. Of course, her experience was great, he implied. She, Josephine, must know a great deal about women. A very great deal.
Well, Josephine had been on this job for fourteen years, except for one year when she'd gone off to Mrs. Dr. Follett. But she'd come back after one year of rebellion. That was all the jobs she'd had. Still, insisted Duff, with three mistresses at once, as it were, that made four women in all, each a type. Josephine must have observed them well.
Josephine bloomed under this mind-broadening discussion. Her latent self-pity lent emotional force to her observations. She didn't quite complain, but she began to talk.
Mrs. Eh'. Follett, now, she was the kind who was all the time reading up about some fancy things to cook in the Ladies' Home Journal, and she'd come out in the kitchen and mess around herself, and they never turned out good, never, just a lot of waste, mostly butter and sugar. Honest, it was a crime. And decorating the table. Mr. Duff wouldn't believe the crazy things she'd do. Have to stand
up a banana in the hole of a piece of pineapple and stick a red cherry on top so it'd look like a candle! Dumb things like that. As if it was going to taste like anything but a banana and a piece of pineapple. Besides, they had to knock the banana down to eat it, didn't they?
Duff sympathized. He understood the scorn of the professional for the enthusiastic amateur.
Of course, here it wasn't any easy job, she told him. Duff surmised shrewdly that there was prestige attached to being the Whitlock drudge, that somewhere in the village Josephine was thought of as one who moved among mysterious luxuries. Because, as became plain, Josephine was a drudge.
'They don't bother me wanting to do no cooking,' said Josephine. 'None of 'em ever wanted to go so far as to boil an egg, as far as I know.'
How different people were from each other, murmured Duff, keeping the high impersonal plane.
That was right. Now, you take Miss Gertrude. She was the kind who hadda have everything just so. Oh, yes, even if she was blind, she could feel dust with her fingers. Kinda spooky, she was. Well, she wanted everything just so, you know, just so; but she never thought about the time you had to do it or how you was going to get it done, either. She didn't care, just so it was done. And done right.
Strict, suggested Duff. There were women like diat Fussy?
Well, no, she wasn't so awful strict. She'd tell you, that's all, and you'd have to try, but it was just that she . . . Well, now, for instance, she'd always think about how it was going to look if somebody came. You know, everything hadda always be ready for company. She didn't have so much company, for the land's sakes. But that's how she was. Always sitting so stiff and straight, just waiting like, for somebody to happen to come in and find her sitting nice and straight.
'A proud woman,' said Duff. 'Ah, yes.'
A proud woman was right. Mr. Duff had got it exactly. She was the one that knew she was a Whitlock, she was. And a Whitlock hadda keep up to snuff. Hard on a girl, let JosephiQe tell you. Because the way she kept up to snuff was giving orders. It was funny how Miss Gertrude
could take so much credit for wanting things just so when she wasn't ever the one who went to work and put them just so. Not her! Too proud to make her own bed, though she probably could if she wanted to. She could do a lot of things, blind though she was. And awful proud of that, too. Josephine looked out the side of her eye at Duff and added quickly, 'Poor lady.'
Well, it was better than feeling sorry for herself, Duff suggested, and Josephine agreed glumly.
With Miss Isabel handicapped, too, Duff went on, all the little chores must fall to Josephine. How hard that must be.
'Talkiug about fussy,' said Josephine, 'she's the one is always at me for something. She tries to help out, though. Land, she's always flying at some job I ain't had time to get around to, but I always have to do it all over, time I get there.' Josephine wrung her dishrag out slowly. 'You know, Mr. Dufi, .there's two ways of doing your work. You can get it done real fast and sit down and rest and have a little time to yourself. I used to do that with Mrs. Dr. Follett. But Miss Isabel can't stand it to see me sitting stiU. She'll think of something. Something gets to worrying her. So I kinda slow up.'
'Of course,' said Duff. 'Naturally.'
'Well, if I was to go rushing around here, I'd be doing twice as much,' said Josephine, 'and there's too much as it is. Now she can figure out ways . . . She don't like to spend money, Miss Isabel don't, so she'll figure I can do it
