What servant ever resisted the temptation to give warning after such a speech as that?  Betty told Molly she was going to leave, in as indifferent a manner as she could possibly assume towards the girl, whom she had tended and been about for the last sixteen years.  Molly had hitherto considered her former nurse as a fixture in the house; she would almost as soon have thought of her father’s proposing to sever the relationship between them; and here was Betty coolly talking over whether her next place should be in town or country.  But a great deal of this was assumed hardness.  In a week or two Betty was in floods of tears at the prospect of leaving her nursling, and would fain have stayed and answered all the bells in the house once every quarter of an hour.  Even Mr. Gibson’s masculine heart was touched by the sorrow of the old servant, which made itself obvious to him every time he came across her by her broken voice and her swollen eyes.

One day he said to Molly, ’I wish you’d ask your mamma if Betty might not stay, if she made a proper apology, and all that sort of thing.’

‘I don’t much think it will be of any use,’ said Molly, in a mournful voice.  ’I know she is writing, or has written, about some under-housemaid at the Towers.’

’Well!—­all I want is peace and a decent quantity of cheerfulness when I come home.  I see enough of tears in other people’s houses.  After all, Betty has been with us sixteen years—­a sort of service of the antique world.  But the woman may be happier elsewhere.  Do as you like about asking mamma; only if she agrees, I shall be quite willing.’

So Molly tried her hand at making a request to that effect to Mrs Gibson.  Her instinct told her she should be unsuccessful; but surely favour was never refused in so soft a tone.

’My dear girl, I should never have thought of sending an old servant away,—­one who has had the charge of you from your birth, or nearly so.  I could not have had the heart to do it.  She might have stayed for ever for me, if she had only attended to all my wishes; and I am not unreasonable, am I?  But, you see, she complained; and when your dear papa spoke to her, she gave warning; and it is quite against my principles ever to take an apology from a servant who has given warning.’

‘She is so sorry,’ pleaded Molly; ’she says she will do anything you wish, and attend to all your orders, if she may only stay.’

’But, sweet one, you seem to forget that I cannot go against my principles, however much I may be sorry for Betty.  She should not have given way to ill-temper.  As I said before, although I never liked her, and considered her a most inefficient servant, thoroughly spoilt by having had no mistress for so long, I should have borne with her—­at least, I think I should—­as long as I could.  Now I have all but engaged Maria, who was under-housemaid at the Towers, so don’t let me hear any more of Betty’s sorrow, or anybody else’s sorrow, for I’m sure, what with your dear papa’s sad stories and other things, I’m getting quite low.’