i was told that someone was wanted at sunnyside who could do cooking. i knew enough for the place, as the family were growing up, and they kept a lot of company. i was sorry for mrs. brind. she told me that she would not live long. she had no relations in adelaide, and her agitation frightened me. she gave me a key and told me to unlock a drawer, and showed me all her things ready for the last ordeal, if the worst should happen. i felt a very great coward, and very uncomfortable. what a relief i felt when the doctor said she was strong enough to go for a change, and that he hoped for good results.
i went and saw lady milne, and i felt a sense of gladness i was to go to sunnyside. it was a strange change for me, but only what might happen to anyone in ordinary everyday life and amid human influences, to look on those loved faces again. i was to have skilled help for all the large parties and balls, and i turned at once to the practical duties of a cook in a gentleman's house. i cannot help adding here that i have been able to get my living in that capacity ever since that time, and that i will give lessons this afternoon on cookery. it was like going back to the old home. i had a good, wise, generous mistress, who would tell me to put aside the past and trust to the future. i hardly knew what i expected in the future, but i was happy there. while in this position i soon recognised that cooking did not come by nature. even the most simple things cannot be done till they are taught. i got a cookery book. i used to puzzle half the night over them, and then i did not get the rudiments from that.
people do not always remain the same, but are continually changing. this can be said of everyone, and growing years make a great difference. while i was away from sunnyside the family, from being children, now seemed to be men and women, most of them. this meant so much more company. as i thought i[pg 81] could not fulfil the duties required of me, i had many painful moments, although they had patience with me. i got to dread the two caterers, who came alternately or both together. the attention they wanted was more to me than all my other work. they took such pains that i should not see anything of their skill, and i had hard toil to learn even gradually. when i had been there more than a year i felt i had learnt scarcely anything.
my brother had got married, and i knew that i had to give up all and expect nothing. for me loneliness never had any terror. no one could be less dependent on outward society than i was, yet i could enjoy it, only i never craved after it, nor was it necessary for my existence—i was one who have had always to stand alone. perhaps the sharpest anguish is that which nobody knows of. i have been so unaccustomed, to sympathy that i can sit still and endure anything; i did everything at my own risk. i have had to work for all i have ever received, and some have done their best to hinder me, so that i hardly knew what to do, although i am sure i was most unselfish. the marriages of my father and brother altered things, and somebody else came in, so that the old relationships were changed. for a time i felt a soreness.
turning things over in my mind, i see that i could not have learned anything at sunnyside, as matters stood. more than once i thought i would like to live in adelaide again, and was tempted to take a post in some of the business places. only homely cooking would then be required, and i could do that well. then, again, sometimes i had to walk all the way to glen osmond by myself if i lost the bus. it was a lonely road, with scarcely a house where parkside now is. all this was long ago.
while i lived at no. 10, rundle-street, i got to know other girls, who were also working housekeepers. one whom i used to see sometimes lived at messrs. wigg & co.'s, in rundle-street. she told me that she was going to be married, and asked whether she should speak for me. it would be nice for me and cheery, she said, but she did not think it would be for very long, as the place was to be rebuilt. my path appeared to be made plain, and i came and saw mr. wigg. he was satisfied, and i came to live at no. 12, rundle-street. i had a comfortable room over the shop. none of the assistants lived there. i used to see to their meals during the day. also under the heading of messrs. wigg and co. there was a chemist's shop, with doctors' consulting-rooms, in king william-street, where the beehive now stands. the chemists had their meals at no. 12. the evenings were lonely, but there were plenty of books, and i could either go out or sit and look into rundle-street. i knew the engagement would be only temporary, but i had always faced my fate with courage, and faced it still. but there seemed nothing to face at mr. wigg's. everyone was bright and pleasant. so i was content[pg 82] to bask in the present enjoyment, and i had given up troubling about what was to me a hopeless future. i had some shipmates at government house, and went and saw them sometimes, and i found that if i left mr. wigg's i could go there. so i was happy, and what more could anyone desire?
while performing my new duties i wondered how things would turn out. for some time i had a busy life, with no time for regrets. the meals were in three relays. the first was at 12.30 p.m., and so on. there was only one young lady among the assistants. the shop was full of men and youths, who served the customers. how different rundle-street looked then. there were only little tumble-down shops, but prosperity reigned, and there were no poor-looking people or naked-footed children.
a change has come now—a great change—that reaches to the core of things. we think we can endure anything, but every day the little things of life drive us nearly wild. pleasures and trials seem both smaller when we have to face them each day.
