"
"Maybe you don't give out enough coffee?" suggested Charlie.
"I don't know how much Milly takes," I replied, innocently.
"Takes! Do you mean to say that you don't know how much coffee goes out of
your pantry, Lulie? I don't wonder we never have any fit to drink!"
If I had been of an argumentative turn, I would have asked Charlie to
explain how giving the cook carte blanche in the matter of quantity should
have had such a disastrous effect in the matter of quality. But I was not
of an argumentative turn, so I took no notice of his queer logic.
"Why should I bother about every spoonful of coffee, Charlie? You assured
me, when I first came here, that every servant you had was as honest as
you or I, and I'm sure Milly knows better than I do how much coffee she
_ought_ to take."
"Well," said Charlie with a sigh of mock resignation, "that may be the way
they do things now-a-days, but I remember exactly how mother managed to
have good coffee." Here the hobby broke into a brisk canter: "I recollect
she had a little oval wooden box, that held, I suppose, about a quart--or
two, maybe--of roasted coffee, and that box stood on the mantelpiece in
her room; and every morning, as soon as her bell rang, Milly would come
with a cup and spoon, and mother would measure out two table-spoonfuls of
coffee with her own hands and give it to the cook, and the cook knew
better than not to have good coffee, I can tell you.
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