think we are not to be trusted, for we'd have to pay in advance, and so
their money's safe; it is something else, and I think I know what it
is. These London men are very sharp, and used to sizing and sorting all
kinds of people as if they was potatoes being got ready for market, and
they have seen that we are not what they call over here gentlefolks."

"No lordly airs, eh?" said Jone.

"Oh, I don't mean that," I answered him back; "lordly airs don't go
into parsonages, and I don't mean either that they see from our looks
or manners that you used to drive horses and milk cows and work in the
garden, and that I used to cook and scrub and was maid-of-all-work on a
canal-boat; but they do see that we are not the kind of people who are
in the habit, in this country, at least, of spending their evenings in
the best parlors of vicarages."

"Do you suppose," said Jone, "that they think a vicar's kitchen would
suit us better?"

"No," said I, "they wouldn't put us in a vicarage at all; there
wouldn't be no place there that would not be either too high or too low
for us. It's my opinion that what they think we belong in is a lordly
house, where you'd shine most as head butler or a steward, while I'd be
the housekeeper or a leading lady's maid."

"By George!" said Jone, getting up from the table, "if any of those
fellows would favor me with an opinion like that I'd break his head."

"You'd have a lot of heads to break," said I, "if you went through this
country asking for opinions on the subject. It's all very well for us
to remember that we've got a house of our own as good as most rectors
have over here, and money enough to hire a minor canon, if we needed
one in the house; but the people over here don't know that, and it
wouldn't make much difference if they did, for it wouldn't matter how
nice we lived or what we had so long as they knew we was retired
servants."

At this Jone just blazed up and rammed his hands into his pockets and
spread his feet wide upon the floor. "Pomona," said he, "I don't mind
it in you, but if anybody else was to call me a retired servant I'd--"

"Hold up, Jone," said I, "don't waste good, wholesome anger." Now, I
tell you, madam, it really did me good to see Jone blaze up and get red
in the face, and I am sure that if he'd get his blood boiling oftener
it would be a good thing for his dyspeptic tendencies and what little
malaria may be left in his system. "It won't do any good to flare up