“Is that your best neckerchief, child?” said the old lady.

“Yes, ma’am,” blushed Madam Liberality,

So when they got home her godmother went to her odds-and-ends drawer.

Podmore never interfered with this drawer.  She was content to be despotic among the dresses, and left the old lady to faddle to her heart’s content with bits of old lace and ribbon which she herself would not have condescended to wear.

The old lady fumbled them over.  There were a good many half-yards of ribbon with very large patterns, but nothing really fit for Madam Liberality’s little neck but a small Indian scarf of many-coloured silk.  It was old, and Podmore would never have allowed her mistress to drive on the esplanade in anything so small and youthful-looking; but the colours were quite bright, and there was no doubt but that Madam Liberality might be provided for by a cheaper neck-ribbon.  So the old lady shut the drawer, and toddled down the corridor that led to Podmore’s room.

She had a good general idea that Podmore’s perquisites were large, but perquisites seem to be a condition of valuable servants in large establishments, and then anything which could be recovered from what had already passed into Podmore’s room must be a kind of economy.  So she resolved that Podmore should “find something” for Madam Liberality’s neck.

“I never noticed it, ma’am, till I brought your shawl to the carriage,” said Podmore.  “If I had seen it before, the young lady shouldn’t have come with you so.  I’ll see to it, ma’am.”

“Thank you, Podmore.”

“Can you spare me to go into the town this afternoon, ma’am?” added the lady’s-maid.  “I want some things at Huckaback and Woolsey’s.”

Huckaback and Woolsey were the linendrapers where Madam Liberality’s godmother “had an account.”  It was one of the things on a large scale over the details of which she had no control.

“You’ll be back in time to dress me?”

“Oh dear, yes, ma’am.”  And having settled the old lady’s shawl on her shoulders, and drawn out her cap-lappets, Podmore returned to her work.

It was a work of kindness.  The old lady might deal shabbily with her faded ribbons and her relations, but the butler, the housekeeper, and the lady’s-maid did their best to keep up the credit of the family.

It was well known that Madam Liberality was a cousin, and Podmore resolved that she should have a proper frock to go down to dessert in.

So she had been very busy making a little slip out of a few yards of blue silk which had been over and above one of the old lady’s dresses, and now she betook herself to the draper’s to get spotted muslin to cover it and ribbons to trim it with.

And whilst Madam Liberality’s godmother was still feeling a few twinges about the Indian scarf, Podmore ordered a pink neckerchief shot with white, and with pink and white fringes, to be included in the parcel.