She said, “You will prefer, I am sure, to give Mary her orders without me. There are not many keys, but I will go and get what I have.” “Not many keys! and you call yourself a housekeeper?” said Polly. Lottie turned away as the little maid came in, looking impertinent enough to be a match for the new mistress; but Lottie was no match for her. She went and got out her little housekeeping-book, which she had kept so neatly. She gathered the keys of the cupboards, which generally stood unlocked, for there was not so much in them that she should lock them up. Lottie had all the instincts of a housekeeper. It gave her positive pain to hand over the symbols of office--to give up her occupation. Her heart sank as she prepared to do it. All her struggles about the bills, her anxious thought how this and that was to be paid, seemed elements of happiness now. She could not bear to give them up. The pain of this compulsory abdication drove everything else out of her head. Love, they say, is all a woman’s life, but only part of a man’s; yet Lottie forgot even Rollo--forgot his love and all the consolation it might bring, in this other emergency, which was petty enough, yet all-important to her. She trembled as she got together these little symbols of her domestic sovereignty. She heard the new mistress of the house coming up the stairs as she did so, talking all the way. “I never heard such impudence,” Polly was saying. “Speak back to her mistress! a bit of a chit of a maid-of-all-work like that. I suppose she’s been let do whatever she pleased; but she’ll find out the difference.” Behind Polly’s voice came a gust of weeping from below, and a cry of, “I’m going to tell mother:” thus hostilities had commenced all along the line. “I can’t think how ever you got on with a creature like that,” said Polly, throwing herself down in the easy-chair. “She don’t know how to do a single thing, as far as I can see; but some folks never seem to mind. She shan’t stay here not a day longer than I can help. I’ve given her warning on the spot. To take impudence from a servant the very first day! But that’s always the way when things are let go; the moment they find a firm hand over them there’s a to-do. To be sure it wasn’t to be looked for that you could know much, Miss, about managing a house.” “Mary is a very good girl,” said Lottie hastily. “She has always done what I told her. Here are the keys of the cupboards, since you wish for them; but there are not any stores to lock away. I get the things every week, just enough to use----”