"Poor Betty!" said Molly, softly.
"Poor old soul! I hope she'll profit by the lesson, I'm sure," sighed
out Mrs. Gibson; "but it's a pity we hadn't Maria before the county
families began to call."
Mrs. Gibson had been highly gratified by the circumstance of so many
calls "from county families." Her husband was much respected; and
many ladies from various halls, courts, and houses, who had profited
by his services towards themselves and their families, thought it
right to pay his new wife the attention of a call when they drove
into Hollingford to shop. The state of expectation into which these
calls threw Mrs. Gibson rather diminished Mr. Gibson's domestic
comfort. It was awkward to be carrying hot, savoury-smelling dishes
from the kitchen to the dining-room at the very time when high-born
ladies, with noses of aristocratic refinement, might be calling.
Still more awkward was the accident which happened in consequence
of clumsy Betty's haste to open the front door to a lofty footman's
ran-tan, which caused her to set down the basket containing the dirty
plates right in his mistress's way, as she stepped gingerly through
the comparative darkness of the hall; and then the young men, leaving
the dining-room quietly enough, but bursting with long-repressed
giggle, or no longer restraining their tendency to practical joking,
no matter who might be in the passage when they made their exit. The
remedy proposed by Mrs. Gibson for all these distressing grievances
was a late dinner. The luncheon for the young men, as she observed
to her husband, might be sent into the surgery. A few elegant cold
trifles for herself and Molly would not scent the house, and she
would always take care to have some little dainty ready for him. He
acceded, but unwillingly, for it was an innovation on the habits of
a lifetime, and he felt as if he should never be able to arrange his
rounds aright with this new-fangled notion of a six o'clock dinner.
"Don't get any dainties for me, my dear; bread-and-cheese is the
chief of my diet, like it was that of the old woman's."
"I know nothing of your old woman," replied his wife; "but really I
cannot allow cheese to come beyond the kitchen."
"Then I'll eat it there," said he. "It's close to the stable-yard,
and if I come in in a hurry I can get it in a moment."
"Really, Mr. Gibson, it is astonishing to compare your appearance and
manners with your tastes. You look such a gentleman, as dear Lady
Cumnor used to say."
Then the cook left; also an old servant, though not so old a one as
Betty. The cook did not like the trouble of late dinners; and, being
a Methodist, she objected on religious grounds to trying any of
Mrs. Gibson's new receipts for French dishes. It was not scriptural,
she said. There was a deal of mention of food in the Bible; but it
was of sheep ready dressed, which meant mutton, and of wine, and
of bread-and-milk, and figs and raisins, of fatted calves, a good
well-browned fillet of veal, and such like; but it had always gone
against her conscience to cook swine-flesh and make raised pork-pies,
and now if she was to be set to cook heathen dishes after the fashion
of the Papists, she'd sooner give it all up together. So the cook
followed in Betty's track, and Mr. Gibson had to satisfy his healthy
English appetite on badly-made omelettes, rissoles, vol-au-vents,
croquets, and timbales; never being exactly sure what he was eating.