“It is more pouring out three or four dozen cups of tea for other people, than having one cup myself, that I have to think about.”
“Yes, Mother, yes,” said Mr. Merry, looking guiltily at the array of cups. “You are always looking after three or four dozen people, it seems to me. But don’t give up heart, Mother, you know. All days are not like today, you know. Why, Mr. Burgess! How are you, Mr. Burgess? Why, you look as fresh as if you were to have a prize. Ah! Anything out of the common is a great thing for you, isn’t it, Mr. Burgess?”
“Well, it depends upon how much it has to do with me, Mr. Merry,” said Mr. Burgess, who had come in brighter for the break in routine, but was already at his level. “It sounds rather a confession, but I am afraid I had not thought of the boys’ prize-giving. It was very self-centred of me.”
“It has brought you down in time, Mr. Burgess, at any rate,” said Miss Basden, draining her cup on her feet.
“I had not thought of it, Miss Basden. But I am glad, if I have even unconsciously honoured the day.”
“Ah, Mr. Burgess, it would not bring you down earlier, would it?”
“It appears that it has, Mr. Merry. But it was an office performed for me quite without my own participation, as I say; though it seems these things are to be settled for me.”
“Boys, now, will you all be in your rooms by half-past eleven?” said Miss Basden, in a sudden, aloof tone, from the door. “By half-past eleven; so that you can have done all you have to do, by twelve, when I shall come round and see that you are properly ready. Do you understand?”
“Can’t any of you speak?” said Mr. Merry. “Can’t you do something else than sit, when a lady makes kind proposals of this sort to you? What do any of you ever do for Miss Basden, that she should go round, when she has so much to do, and see that you are all ready? Now, thank Miss Basden; and say that, of course, you will be ready to the moment.”
“Fanny,” said Mrs. Merry, “will you remember that I shall want you all down in the basement this morning? So none of you are to be upstairs at all, after the rooms are done. Miss Herrick is answering the front door bell.”
“What, Mother?” said Mr. Merry, leaning to his wife. “Miss Herrick, Mother? Miss Herrick answering the front door bell! Why, is that necessary, Mother? Does Mr. Herrick know about that?”
“Quite necessary, dear; or I should not have arranged it.”
“Yes, but Mother, Miss Herrick! Miss Herrick, you know! Why, I should not have thought that … I mean, is that all right, Mother?”
“Quite, dear. It is just a little arrangement between Miss Herrick and me.”
“Yes, Mother,” said Mr. Merry, with compliment in his tone towards his wife’s relation with the sister of the head. “But, you know, Mother! Well, wasn’t there any way at all out of it but that?”
“None at all, dear. Unless you can spare me one of the boys, to sit in the hall all the morning and answer the bell?”
“Oh, well, Mother! I don’t mean that they wouldn’t be a great deal more useful, sitting in the hall, and answering the bell, than doing anything they will be doing. For what will be the good of teaching them this morning, sitting patiently and trying to teach them, half dressed as they are, and their heads full of every kind of thing but what they ought to be full of? But you know, Mother”—Mr. Merry spoke low—“the parents, you know! If it got to them, all about being used, and missing a morning’s work, you know! So I don’t think, Mother …”
“Oh, of course I didn’t really mean it, dear!” said Mrs. Merry, half laughing. “And a boy would not be any good to me, really.”
“No. A boy would not be any good to you, really! A boy would not be of any good to you! Oh, wouldn’t he? I am sure he would not. Now there is a thing to get about, about you all! Here is Mother, kind as she is, having to say that!”
“You might stay with the boys until they have finished their breakfast, dear,” said Mrs. Merry, speaking with her hand on the edge of the table; “and then get them out as soon as possible. We are not going to have prayers this morning, so that the maids can get in to clear the room.”
Mr. Merry waited with his eyes on the door, until it closed behind his wife.
“Not going to have prayers this morning! Oh! So you are to miss that out, are you, besides all the other things you have missed out today? It seems that the only things you are to have today, are meals and prizes. I don’t wonder that the custom of giving prizes is getting to be talked against. I don’t wonder. And I tell you, there is one thing you will have this morning, and that is your work. So get up, and get out, whether you have finished your breakfast or not. ‘Stay with the boys until they have finished their breakfast!’ Am I a nursemaid,
