"You must pardon me for intruding without any real business reason,"
said the pretty woman, "but I want to apologize for my children
worrying you the other day. About birthday presents."
"Oh, yes," said Ben. "They were yours, then?"
"Yes," said her visitor, "but they had no right to take up your time
like that."
"I was delighted that they did," said Ben. "Children are very rare
in this business. It's a very pleasant change after the usual run of
clients. And I thought it very clever of them to think of coming to me
at all. Very few children would be so original."
"My name is Hill-Owen, and we live just round the corner in Eaton
Square," said the visitor. "And since I _am_ here, I wonder if you
would give me advice as to my cook. She's young and very pretty, and
she cooks very well, but she's terribly attractive to Guardsmen. I
suppose good cooks are as difficult to find as ever?"
"More so," said Ben. "It's not part of my business. This isn't a
registry office. But from the inquiries I get, I should say that the
world's greatest need at this moment is cooks."
"Then you agree with my husband," said Mrs. Hill-Owen, "who says,
'Never mind about the Guardsmen so long as dinner is all right'?"
"I should take some precautions," said Ben. "I don't think Guardsmen
ought to be there after ten, say."
"Guardsmen are very difficult to dislodge," said Mrs. Hill-Owen, "and
I'm afraid to go down and interfere, she's so touchy. She might give
notice. It's the worst of this Knightsbridge district. I thought of a
wonderful plan the other day, and that was to make her bring the key of
the basement door up at ten every night; but as my husband said, 'How
can you tell she's locked it?' It's really a terrible responsibility.
And we're away so much too. What would you do?"
"I?" said Ben. "I should do my best to forget."
"Would you? How clever of you! Thank you so much. I'll try to."
This was one of Ben's odd days.
Mrs. Hill-Owen (she told me) had not been gone more than a few minutes
when a Rolls Royce purred up to the door of "The Booklovers' Rest," and
a richly dressed young woman emerged and made her way upwards to "The
Beck and Call."
Ben, chancing to be in the front office, received her in person, and
asked her requirements.
"I want," said the girl, "an engagement as parlour-maid."
"_You_ want?" Ben exclaimed. "But for someone else, of course."
"Oh, no," said the girl. "For myself. I want to go into service."
"Come inside," said Ben. "I must get this clear. You want," she said,
when they were seated, "a situation as a parlour-maid?"
"Yes," said the girl. "But it must be in a really good house--a
nobleman's for choice."
Ben's surprise led the girl to be confidential.
"I ought to explain," she said, "especially as I've had no experience
of anything but helping mother at home. The fact is dad has suddenly
become rich--enormously rich--and everything has changed. We used to
live in a little house in Ealing, but now dad's bought one of those
great places on Kingston Hill. He's happy enough, pottering about the
garden, but it's very lonely for mother and me, because many of our
old friends have disappeared--frightened, I suppose--and we can't make
new ones of the new kind because--well, we're not easy with them. We
don't know how to behave or what to say. They've called, you see. So
I thought it would be a wonderful thing if I took service in a good
family and kept my eyes open. I'm very quick; I should soon pick it up;
and someone was saying that 'The Beck and Call' was the best place to
come to with any inquiry, so I came. What do you think, miss?"
"You would have to keep your secret," said Ben.
"Oh, yes, of course," the girl replied.
"You'd have to leave that car behind."
"I shall love to," said the girl. "It's largely because of the
chauffeur that I want to learn. He's so superior. Mother and dad, of
course, will never be able to deal with servants, but I feel that after
a little while I shall know enough to keep them in their place. And of
course when I'm through we shall have new ones, and so start fair."
"Well," said Ben, "I think it's a most original plan. The principal
difficulty is the noblemen. They're all so poor now that they probably
do their own parlour-maiding. I know one personally who describes
himself as the 'Gentleman with a duster,' and one of the most famous
of our dukes boasts that he cleans the windows. You would take the
lowest wages, of course?"
"Oh, yes," said the girl; "or none at all."
"No," said Ben, "that would be very foolish. Never do that. You would
be suspected at once; and if the other servants found out they would be
impossible to you. By the way, had you thought of the other servants?"
"Oh, yes."
"The footman?"
"Yes. But I've got to go through with it, and I'm very quick. You don't
think it's unfair to the people who engage me to use them in this way?"
"No, I don't think so. All life is a lesson, and this is quite funny.
But the real joke will come when you meet them later on, on level
terms."
"Oh," said the girl, "how terrible! I never thought of that. I must--I
must think a little more about it," she added, "and talk to mother."
She went off, and Ben watched the chauffeur's face as she got into the
car. It certainly had an expression that needed very drastic treatment.