Antique dealers -- Fiction; English fiction -- 20th century
After the funeral, when she returned to Soho Square, a surprise awaited
her. Quinney had fulfilled his promise. In the sanctuary, at a
beautiful Carlton desk, sat Miss Mabel Dredge, a young and attractive
woman, the typist and stenographer. Poor Susan experienced tearing pangs
of jealousy when she beheld her, but Quinney’s treatment of the stranger
was reassuring. Obviously, he regarded Miss Dredge as a machine.
And his unaffected delight over Susan’s return home was positively
rejuvenating.
*CHAPTER XIV*
*JAMES MIGGOTT*
*I*
In common with other great men who have achieved success, Quinney was
endowed with a Napoleonic faculty of picking the right men to serve him.
Having done so, he treated them generously, so that they remained in his
service, loath to risk a change for the worse. He paid good wages, and
was complaisant in the matter of holidays.
James Miggott had been his most fortunate discovery. James was "brainy"
(we quote Quinney), ambitious, healthy, and an artist in his line: the
repairing of valuable old furniture. Also he was good-looking, which
counted with his employer. A few weeks after joining the establishment
it had been arranged that he should sleep in a comfortable room in the
basement, and take his meals at a restaurant in Old Compton Street.
During his provincial circuits Quinney liked to know that a man was in
charge of the house at night. James’s habits, apparently, were as
regular as his features.
By this time he had come to be regarded as foreman. Bit by bit he had
won Quinney’s entire confidence. The master talked to the man more
freely than he talked to Susan about everything connected with his
business. James listened attentively, made occasionally some happy
suggestion, and betrayed no signs of a swollen head. A natural
inflation might have been expected. Quinney’s eyes failed to detect it.
Moreover, Susan liked him, and respected him. He attended Divine service
on Sundays; he ate and drank in moderation; he was scrupulously neat in
appearance; he had received a sound education, and expressed himself
well in good English. Truly a paragon!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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