Altogether, it did not work satisfactorily: Miss Jones was careless, idle, and impudent; her step-mother was dissatisfied because she was not taken into the house; and Clerk Gum threatened every day, and his wife very often, to dismiss her.
It was only within a year or two that they had not kept an indoor servant; and the fact of their not doing so now puzzled the gossips of Calne.

The clerk's emoluments were the same as ever; there was no Willy to encroach on them now; and the work of the house required a good servant.

However, it pleased Mrs.Gum to have one in only by day; and who was to interfere with her if the clerk did not?
Jabez Gum worked on for some little time after eight o'clock, the breakfast-hour.

He rather wondered he was not called to it, and registered a mental vow to discharge Miss Becky.

Presently he went indoors, put his head into a small sitting-room on the left, and found the room empty, but the breakfast laid.