Mortimer, who
certainly could have told the greater part of it, had (so far as was
known) never told it at all.
Everybody said he had knocked up Swan and Mrs. Swan at six o'clock one
morning, and sent the former to call up Matthew the coachman, who also
lived out of the house. "And that," said Swan, when he admitted the fact
to after questioners, "Matthew never will forgive me for doing. He hates
to get his orders through other folks, specially through me. He allus
grudges me the respect as the family can't help feeling for me. Not but
that he gets his share, but he counts nothing his if it's mine too. He'd
like to pluck the very summer out of my almanack, and keep it in his own
little back parlour." Everybody said, also, that Mrs. Swan had made the
fire that morning in Mr. Mortimer's kitchen, and that Matthew had waited
on him and his four daughters at breakfast, nobody else being in the
house, gentle or simple.
Gentle or simple. That was certainly true, for the governess had taken
her departure two days previously.
After this, everybody said that Matthew brought the carriage round, and
Mr.
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