As for the rest she had been professionally trained
to take care of her interests as well as to cook and the ethics
of the days of her grandmother when there had been servants with
actual affections had not reached her.
"Oh! go away! Go AWA-AY!" Feather almost shrieked.
"I am going, ma'am. So are Edward and Emma and Louisa. It's no
use waiting and giving the month's notice. We shouldn't save the
month's wages and the trades-people wouldn't feed us. We can't stay
here and starve. And it's a time of the year when places has to
be looked for. You can't hold it against us, ma'am. It's better
for you to have us out of the house tonight--which is when our
boxes will be taken away."
Then was Feather seized with a panic. For the first time in her
life she found herself facing mere common facts which rose before
her like a solid wall of stone--not to be leapt, or crept under,
or bored through, or slipped round. She was so overthrown and
bewildered that she could not even think of any clever and rapidly
constructed lie which would help her; indeed she was so aghast
that she did not remember that there were such things as lies.
"Do you mean," she cried out, "that you are all going to LEAVE
the house--that there won't be any servants to wait on me--that
there's nothing to eat or drink--that I shall have to stay here
ALONE--and starve!"
"We should have to starve if we stayed," answered Cook simply.
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