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But, to be openly told so, and by his cook, was a little too much. The worm will turn at least we are told that it will and Daniel Dott was turning. He jerked his hands from his pockets and opened his mouth. "Azuba!" he roared. "You, Zuba, come here!" Azuba did not answer. She was in her room at the top of the house and, of course, did not hear the shout.
Hapgood's face was red, his fists were clenched, and he was shaking one of them under the housekeeper's nose. "Give it to me!" he ordered. "'And it over now, or I'll bash you good and 'ard." Azuba merely smiled. "You'll bash nobody," she declared. "You're a thief, that's what you are a low-down thief. I've always cal'lated you was one, ever since I laid eyes on you; now I know it.
Think of that dish water; it's gettin' cooler every minute." The answer to this was an indignant snort followed by the bang of the door. Azuba had gone. Captain Daniel looked after her, smiled faintly, shook his head, and again turned his attention to the letter in his hand. He did not open it immediately.
His wife sprang at the bonnet, but he barred her off with an arm like a fence-rail, removed a lid from the stove, put the unbecoming article in on the red-hot coals, and replaced the lid. "There!" he said, "that helps the scenery, don't it? Now let's have supper." Captain Dan laughed again. For an instant Azuba stared, white-faced, at the cremation of the bonnet. Then she darted to the door.
"But but, by Godfreys, you're the last person I expected to see just now." "Yep, I shouldn't wonder." "Sit down, sit down. Humph! Does Azuba know you're comin'?" "No, not yet." "Well, sit down and I'll call her. She's here with us, of course." "Sartin she is. Where else would she be? I knew she was here; heard you hailin' her just as I made port at the back door. Set down?"
Miss Matilda had peeped through a crack of the door and made this observation and the remark founded thereon. Continuing her attitude of attention, she overheard Mrs. Crane and her two daughters conversing in the attiring-room, up one flight. "How fine everything is in the great house!" said Mrs. Crane, "jest look at the picters!" "Matildy Sprowle's drawin's," said Ada Azuba, the eldest daughter.
Once he found her in the kitchen talking with Azuba, and on another occasion she and Mr. Hapgood were in conversation, but for her father she could spare only odd moments. The captain did not know what to make of it. When, taking advantage of a fleeting opportunity, he asked her she only laughed. "I am very busy, Daddy," she said. "You mustn't bother." "Bother! Well, I like that!
Colonel Sprowle, who, you remember, was a Jordan, had nipped the Colonel's statement in the middle of the word Mr. Peckham finished, with a look that jerked him like one of those sharp twitches women keep giving a horse when they get a chance to drive one. Mr. and Mrs. Crane, Miss Ada Azuba, and Miss Mahala Crane made their entrance.
Don't talk to me about HIM!" Mr. Hapgood was not re-engaged nor forgiven, and Hungerford kindly volunteered to find a competent successor. He would make some inquiries among his friends, the right sort of people, he said, and his manner indicated that the said people were accustomed to employing butlers in droves. Azuba, therefore, was left with all the domestic cares upon her hands.
"From Laban, is it?" asked Mr. Bangs casually. "Yup, it's from Labe." "There was another from him, then. At any rate there was one addressed in the same hen-tracks to Azuba. I met her as I was coming out of the post-office and gave it to her; she was on her way to the grocery store, she said." Daniel nodded, but made no comment. He was doing his best to decipher Mr. Ginn's hieroglyphics.
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