look
decent?" asked Mr. Haydon suddenly; there was the humility of broken
pride in his tone. "I can't seem to find nothin' to do with, anywhere
about the house. I s'posed I knew where everything was. I expect I've
got out all poor mother's best things, without knowin' the difference.
Except there ain't nothin' nowhere that looks right to me," he added.

William stooped to pick something out of the chips. "You'll have to
ask Marilla," he said. "It mortifies me to have you go on in such a
way. Now, father, you wouldn't hear to anybody that was named to you,
but if you go on this way much longer you'll find that any
housekeeper's better than none."

"Why, I've only been waiting to hear of a proper person," said Israel
Haydon, turning an innocent and aggrieved countenance upon his son.
"My house is in a terrible state, now I can tell you."

William looked away and tried to keep his face steady.

"What do you find to laugh at?" asked the poor father, in the tone of
a schoolmaster.

"Don't you know I spoke of somebody to you? I believe 't was the very
day after the funeral," said William persuasively. "Her name is Maria
Durrant."

"I remember the person well; an excellent, sensible woman, no
flummery, and did remarkable well in case of sickness at your house,"
said Mr. Haydon, with enthusiasm, stepping briskly toward the wagon
after he had shut and fastened the wood-house doors and put the
padlock key in his pocket. "What of her? You said there was no chance
of getting her, didn't you?"

"I was afraid so; but she's left her brother's folks now, and come to
stop a little while with Marilla. She's at the house this minute; came
last night. You know, Marilla's very fond of having her cousins come
to stop with her," apologized the son, in fear lest his simple plot
should be discovered and resented. "You can see if she's such a person
as you want. I have been thinking all day that she might do for a
time, anyway."

"Anybody'll do," said Mr. Haydon suddenly. "I tell ye, William, I'm
drove to the wall. I feel to covet a good supper; an' I'm ashamed to
own it, a man o' my property! I'll observe this Miss Durrant, an'
speak with her after tea; perhaps she'd have the sense to come right
over to-morrow. You an' Marilla can tell her how I've been situated. I
wa'n't going to have no such persons in my house as were recommended,"
he grumbled on cheerfully. "I don't keep a town-farm for the
incapable, nor do I want an old grenadi