"I wouldn't give much for their promises," answered Sarah, the maid, when, in reply to a comment of hers on the subject, she was told so by Mrs. Dorothea Arden, her mistress.
"And here's no sofa, ma'am," she continued; "how are you to be sitting, the length of an evening, stuck upright on one of these here _ricketty_ bits of chairs, I'd be glad to know."
"Why, it will not be very comfortable, to be sure," answered Mrs. Dorothea, "so long as it lasts; but she has promised faithfully, that as soon as the sick lady goes away, which will be in about a week, she will let me have the sofa out of the next drawing-room."
"A bird in the hand's worth two in the bush!" replied Sarah. "I dare say if the truth was known, they're not worth a sofa; or, if they are, they'll keep it in the next room, when it is vacant, to be a decoy-duck to another lodger. They're not going to let you have it, I promise you, now that they have got you fast for a month certain."
"Well, if they don't, I can't help it," said Mrs. Dorothea; "one can't have every thing you know; and the new carpet certainly gives the room a very respectable appearance. And then there is a chiffonier; that's a great comfort to put one's groceries in; or a few biskets; or a bottle of wine, if one should be obliged to open one. The doors, to be sure, are lined with blue and they should have been pink."
"And here's no key," said Sarah, examining the chiffonier; "and I declare if the lock _ante_ broke."
"That is provoking," said Mrs. Dorothea, "she must get me a lock."
Sarah was now dispatched with her bandboxes, and ordered to hurry the dinner and unpack the things.
In about half an hour, Aunt Dorothea becoming hungry and impatient, rang her bell. Sarah reappeared, with a countenance of the utmost discontent, declaring she was never in such a place in her life; that there was no getting any thing done, and that as to unpacking, there was no use in attempting it, in a place where they should never be able to stop. When the dinner was asked for, she replied, that she believed it had been done some time, but that she supposed there was no one to bring it up, for all they had engaged to do the waiting. "But there's sixteen of themselves, shop boys and all; and they _gets_ their own tea the while your dinner's a cooking it seems."