The Treasure | Page 7

Lizzie.
And at first Lizzie really did seem perfection. It was some weeks before Mrs. Salisbury realized that Lizzie was not truthful; absolutely reliable in money matters, yet Lizzie could not be believed in the simplest statement. Tasteless oatmeal, Lizzie glibly asseverated, had been well salted; weak coffee, or coffee as strong as brown paint, were the fault of the pot. Lizzie, rushing through dinner so that she might get out; Lizzie throwing out cold vegetables that "weren't worth saving"; Lizzie growing snappy and noisy at the first hint of criticism, somehow seemed worse sometimes than no servant at all.
"I wonder--if we moved into New Troy, Kane," Mrs. Salisbury mused, "and got one of those wonderful modern apartments, with a gas stove, and a dumbwaiter, and hardwood floors, if Sandy and I couldn't manage everything? With a woman to clean and dinners downtown now and then, and a waitress in for occasions."
"And me jumping up to change the salad plates, Mother!" Alexandra put in briskly. "And a pile of dishes to do every night!"
"Gosh, let's not move into the city--" protested Stanford. "No tennis, no canoe, no baseball!"
"And we know everyone in River Falls, we'd have to keep coming out here for parties!" Sandy added.
"Well," Mrs. Salisbury sighed, "I admit that it is too much of a problem for me!" she said. "I know that I married your father on twenty dollars a week," she told the children severely, "and we lived in a dear little cottage, only eighteen dollars a month, and I did all my own work! And never in our lives have we lived so well. But the minute you get inexperienced help, your bills simply double, and inexperienced help means simply one annoyance after another. I give it up!"
"Well, I'll tell you, Mother," Alexandra offered innocently; "perhaps we don't systematize enough ourselves. It ought to be all so well arranged and regulated that a girl would know what she was expected to do, and know that you had a perfect right to call her down for wasting or slighting things. Why couldn't women--a bunch of women, say--"
"Why couldn't they form a set of household rules and regulations?" her mother intercepted smoothly. "Because--it's just one of the things that you young, inexperienced people can talk very easily about," she interrupted herself to say with feeling, "but it never seems to occur to any one of you that every household has its different demands and regulations. The market fluctuates, the size of a family changes--fixed laws are impossible! No. Lizzie is no worse than lots of others, better than the average. I shall hold on to her!"
"Mrs. Sargent says that all these unnecessary demands have been instituted and insisted upon by women," said Alexandra. "She says that the secret of the whole trouble is that women try to live above their class, and make one servant appear to do the work of three--"
The introduction of Mrs. Sargent's name was not a happy one.
"Ellen Sargent," said Mrs. Salisbury icily, "is not a lady herself, in the true sense of the word, and she does very well to talk about class distinctions! She was his stenographer when Cyrus Sargent married her, and the daughter of a tannery hand. Now, just because she has millions, I am not going to be impressed by anything Ellen Sargent does or says!"
"Mother, I don't think she meant quality by 'class,'" Sandy protested. "Everyone knows that Grandfather was General Stanford, and all that! But I think she meant, in a way, the money side of it, the financial division of people into classes!"
"We won't discuss her," decided Mrs. Salisbury majestically. "The money standard is one I am not anxious to judge my friends by!"
Still, with the rest of the family, Mrs. Salisbury was relieved when Lizzie, shortly after this, decided of her own accord to accept a better-paid position. "Unless, Mama says, you'd care to raise me to seven a week," said Lizzie, in parting.
"No, no, I cannot pay that," Mrs. Salisbury said firmly and Lizzie accordingly left.
Her place was taken by a middle-aged French woman, and whipped cream and the subtle flavor of sherry began to appear in the Salisbury bills of fare. Germaine had no idea whatever of time, and Sandy perforce must set the table whenever there was a company dinner afoot, and lend a hand with the last preparations as well. The kitchen was never really in order in these days, but Germaine cooked deliciously, and Mrs. Salisbury gave eight dinners and a club luncheon during the month of her reign. Then the French woman grew more and more irregular as to hours, and more utterly unreliable as to meals; sometimes the family fared delightfully, sometimes there was almost nothing for dinner. Germaine seemed to fade from sight, not entirely of her