A Holiday in Bed, and Other SketchesBarrie, J. M. (James Matthew)
General
A Holiday in Bed, and Other Sketches
Barrie, J. M. (James Matthew)
Essays; Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction
my guest addressed to me, and if I am too quick for her she explains
away my answer, or modifies it, or signifies her approval of it. Then I
try to be dignified and to show Janet her place. If I catch her eye I
frown, but such opportunities are rare, for it is the guest on whom she
concentrates herself. She even tells him, in my presence, little things
about myself which I would prefer to keep to myself. The impression
conveyed by her is that I confide everything to her. When my guest
remarks that I am becoming a hardened bachelor, and I hint that it is
because the ladies do not give me a chance, Janet breaks in with--
"Oh, deed it's a wonder he wasn't married long since, but the one he
wanted wouldn't have him, and the ones that want him he won't take. He's
an ill man to please."
"Ah, Janet," the guest may say (for he enjoys her interference more than
I do), "you make him so comfortable that you spoil him."
"Maybe," says Janet, "but it took me years to learn how to manage him."
"Does he need to be managed?"
"I never knew a man that didna."
Then they get Janet to tell them all my little "tantrums" (as she calls
them), and she holds forth on my habit of mislaying my hat and then
blaming her, or on how I hate rice pudding, or on the way I have worn
the carpet by walking up and down the floor when I would be more
comfortable in a chair. Now and again I have wound myself up to the
point of reproving Janet when the guest had gone, but the result is that
she tells her select friends how "quick in the temper" I am. So Janet
must remain as she has grown and it is gratifying to me (though don't
let on) to know that she turns up her nose at every other minister who
preaches in my church. Janet is always afraid when I go off for a
holiday that the congregations in the big towns will "snap me up." It is
pleasant to feel that she has this opinion of me, though I know that the
large congregations do not share it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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