The Skeleton Crew; Or, Wildfire Ned — page 108: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

sate 102 THE SKELETON CREW; OR, WILDFIRE NED. Nee ee eee SSS for really it’ seems to smell of nothing else but grease and dirt. “ Nobody looks clean at that house; and, 4s to feeding, good gracious! you should only see what half-starved wretches they are, Well, how can it be otherwise, my dear ? : “She goes off to market, and buys up all kinds of rubbish, which I wouldn’t touch. She boards ’em cheap, and is a regular vixen, my dear ; a perfect ‘hurricane’ as my poor, lost sailor husband used to say. “But then, of course, there is no comparison between me and such a woman as that. How she gets along with the Germans, and French, and others who live in her place, I can’t see. “They are always having rows there, but no one can even whisper, and say that anything of the kind ever happened to my house, except once, when two of the lodgers, young city clerks, fell out about a servant girl, who was rather good-looking, and knocked each other down stairs. “You have no notion, my dear, of my troubles. “If I have mutton as the principal dish some one grumbles ; if I have beef another sniffs and says he’s dined already, *“Then Mistress this is too lazy to come down to breakfast, and almost pulls the bell down for Sarah to take it up to her, “Then Miss the other, her daughter, don’t like tea nor coffee and must have chocolate and. toast; while two or three others eat hot cakes faster than we can make ’em ; and then there’s more grumbling and threatening to leave, until it worries my very life out almost. ‘“‘T don’t care much about how the men talk, you know, because I can manage them. “If their boots and hot water aren’t ready I can plead an excuse of some kind, and even if they do ‘burst out’ like, and tell you what they think, and threaten to go, I don’t dislike ’em, because, as my poor husband used to say, ‘after the storm there’s always a calm,’ and then my turn comes. “Tf they owe anything I talks like a sensible woman to ’em, and ‘rides a high horse,’ but if they don’t I only smiles, and takes no notice. “Oh, I can get along with theemen, my dear, I always could. I would rather have to do with ten men than one woman; and wouldn’t have one in the house at all if I could help it. “ But, then, you see, my dear, men will have women in the house; I don’t blame ’em a bit, it looks natural like, “A house don’t look right. without a woman or two but ; heaven keep me from haying a houseful of young women and young men! “J tried it once, but it wouldn’t answer, my dear. “Oh, the sorrow and vexation I had with ’em. I had my hands full, and soon gave it up. “Young widows in the house are just as bad. “I abominate widows in the house from my heart, particularly when young and handsome, although I am a widow myself, “ There’s always trouble about ’em,. and they are always flirting with, some one, and getting the: men into fusses, ‘“But what can you do, my dear? You must have some one that’s attractive to keep the men together, otherwise the place would be as cold and cheerless to. ’em as.an ice-house, ‘‘ But, then, my dear, they talk so much, there’s no end to their chatter, “You can’t. keep ’em from it, and the older they Bet the more they have to say about. their neigh- oure. “Not that Z care, you know, my dear; they can talk as much as they like for all me, so they pays | their bills, and don’t actually insult me to my face. — “ But it is very aggravating, my dear, to see ’em chatting and whispering in each other’s rooms, pass- ing unkind remarks behind one’s back, and appear- ing all smiles and friendly like before your face. “Tt don’t matter what you do for ’em, my dear, they will talk about you; and, although ’m no eaves-dropper, and wouldn’t listen at any ones door for all the world, I do know certain things of certain parties, which would surprise certain quar- ters, if it was only whispered in their ear confiden- tially, my dear. “But I’m not one of that kind; I know my _ position too well for that, my dear, and wouldn’t lower my dignity by peeping into their rooms when they are out, not me! or prying into boxes and drawers, and rummaging about with their work- boxes and private notes. No indeed, nothing of that kind in my house, my dear. “Tf they meets me on the landing and says, “«Dame Worthington, will you come in for a few moments.?’ “TI always says, , “Certainly, with pleasure, Mistress Perkias ; how do you do this morning ma’am ? you are looking very well, I never saw you look so young and captivating, indeed I didn’t. Come in! of course I will, for a few minutes, to have a friendly chat, like, about o!d times.’ 3 ‘“‘ But I always says, . «Please don’t offer me any. refreshment, Mistress Perkins,’ I says, ‘because my stomach is weak, and I can’t stand it ; a thimbleful of brandy would knock me over, my dear, in a minute.’ — “Because a glass of ginger wine don’t cost much, you know, my dear; and if you accepts thez little deceitful offers, they always takes advantage of it to wear the very legs off the poor seryant girl, and me too, if I’d let ’em. “But [lets ’em ring away till tired, and takes no notice, until they comes down stairs themselves, and then when they knocks at my door, I seems surprised not to hear the bell, and then they gets what they want. “Bless you, my dear, if something wasn’t done, we sliould wear the stairs out. “ First there’s old Mr. Brown up-stairs, he wants hot water half-a-dozen times a day and can’t hear the dinner bell without it is rung outside his door. “ Mistress Perkins is always in want of some- thing, and that wretched pet dog of hers is alrvays causing trouble. “It was only the other day I missed a beefsteak off the kitchen table, and at last I traced it up-stairs to Mistress Perkins,’ door, where the dog stood growling and showing his teeth, until in fright I upset the servant maid and her pail of water, and fell headlong down stairs,”’ The smiling old scoundrel, Sir Andrew, would sit and listen to the good old dame, as she recounted her trials and troubles, and would nod in approval as meekly as a lamb. But he, was a deep designing old villain, as we shall see. ~ It is true that the old dame had fallen downstairs and seriously hurt herself and was then yery ill. He also had learned that, in some way, she was a very distant relation of his, and the only one then living. This discovery greatly surprised old Dame Wor- thington, and Sir Richard Warbeck also; but the cunning scoundrel supported, his statement to ‘relationship with,so much plausible, but fictitious, evidence that both Sir Richard and Dame Wor- Gom Eboo €55 Gom