Pass the time? I who am so much afraid of Time's passing me that I try to catch at him as he goes, pull him back, make him creep slowly while I squeeze the full preciousness out of every minute? I gazed at her abstractedly, haunted by the recollection of flying days, days gone so quickly, vanished before I well knew how happy I was being. 'I really couldn't tell you,' I said.
'Hard-working, clean, honest,--' read out the Fraulein, reminding me that I was busy.
'Moral,' I dictated, 'able to wash--'
'You will never find one,' interrupted Frau Meyer again. 'At least, never one who is both moral and able to wash. Two good things don't go together with these girls, I find. The trouble I am in for want of one!
They are as scarce and as expensive as roses in December. Since April I have had three, and all had to leave by the merest accident--nothing at all to do with the place or me; but the ones in there seem to know there have been three in the time, and make the most extravagant demands. I have been here the whole morning, and am in despair.'
She stopped to fan herself with her handkerchief.
'Able to wash,' I resumed, 'iron, cook, mend--have you any one suitable, Fraulein?'
'Many,' was the laconic answer.
'I'm afraid we cannot give more than a hundred and sixty marks,' said I.
'Pooh,' said Frau Meyer; and there was a pause in the scratching of the pen.
'But there are no children,' I continued.
The pen went on more glibly. Frau Meyer fanned herself harder.
'And only two _Herrschaften_.'
The pen skimmed over the paper.
'We live up--we live up on the Galgenberg.'
The pen stopped dead.
'You will never find one who will go up there,' cried Frau Meyer triumphantly. 'I need not fear your taking a good one away from me. They will not leave the town.'
The Fraulein rang a bell and called out a name. 'It is another one for you, Frau Doctor,' she said; and a large young lady came in from the other room. 'The general servant Fraulein Ottilie Krummacher--Frau Doctor Meyer,' introduced the Fraulein. 'I think you may suit each other.'
'It is time you showed me some one who will,' groaned Frau Meyer. 'Six have I already interviewed, and the demands of all are enough to make my mother, who was Frau Gutsbesitzer Grosskopf of the Grosskopfs of Grosskopfsecke, born Knoblauch, and a lady of the most exact knowledge in household matters, turn in her grave.'
'Town?' asked the large girl quickly, hardly allowing Frau Meyer to get to a full stop, and obviously callous as to the Grosskopfs of Grosskopfsecke.
'Yes, yes--here, overlooking the market-place and the interesting statue of the electoral founder of the University. No way to go, therefore, to market. Enlivening scenes constantly visible from the windows--'
'Which floor?'
'Second. Shallow steps, and a nice balustrade. Really hardly higher than the first floor, or even than an ordinary ground floor, the rooms being very low.'
'Washing?'
'Done out of the house. Except the smallest, fewest trifles such as--such as--ahem. The ironing, dear Fraulein, I will do mostly myself.
There are the shirts, you know--husbands are particular--'
'How many?'
'How many?' echoed Frau Meyer. 'How many what?'
'Husbands.'
'_Aber_, Fraulein,' expostulated the secretary.
'She said husbands,' said the large girl. 'Shirts, then--how many? It's all the same.'
'All the same?' cried Frau Meyer, who adored her husband.
'In the work it makes.'
'But, dear Fraulein, the shirts are not washed at home.'
'But ironed.'
'I iron them.'
'And I heat the irons and keep up the fire to heat them with.'
'Yes, yes,' cried Frau Meyer, affecting the extreme pleasure of one who has just received an eager assurance, 'so you do.'
The large girl stared. 'Cooking?' she inquired, after a slightly stony pause.
'Most of that I will do myself, also. The Herr is very particular. I shall only need a little--quite a little assistance. And think of all the new and excellent dishes you will learn to make.'
The girl waved this last inducement aside as unworthy of consideration.
'Number of persons in the household?'
Frau Meyer coughed before she could answer. 'Oh,' said she, 'oh, well--there is my husband, and naturally myself, and then there are--there are--are you fond of children?' she ended hastily.
The girl fixed her with a suspicious eye. 'It depends how many there are,' she said cautiously.
Frau Meyer got up and leaned over the Fraulein at the desk, and whispered into her impassive ear.
The Fraulein shook her head. 'I am afraid it is no use,' she said.
Frau Meyer whispered again. The Fraulein looked up, and fastening her eyes on a point somewhere below the large girl's chin said, 'The wages are good.'
'What are they?' asked the girl.
'Considering the treatment you will receive--' the girl's eyes again became suspicious--'they are excellent.'
'What are they?'
'Everything found, and a hundred and eighty marks a year.'
The girl turned and walked toward the door.