Daily chamber work and dusting, etc., one and one-half hours
per day. Weekly cleaning for house of nine rooms, with halls, stairs,
closets, porches, steps, walks, etc., sweeping, dusting, washing
windows, mopping, scouring, etc., averaging two hours per day. Door
service, waiting on tradesmen, and extras one-half hour per day. Total
ten hours per day."
"That sounds well. Does it take that much time every day?"
"Yes, indeed! It would take me twenty!" she answered. "You know the
week I was here alone I never did half she does. Of course I had Baby,
but then I didn't do the things. I guess when it doesn't take so long
they just don't do what ought to be done. For she is quick, awfully
quick about her work. And she's thorough. I suppose it ought to be
done that way--but I never had one before."
"She keeps mighty fresh and bright-looking after these herculean
labors."
"Yes, but then she rests! Her ten hours are from six-thirty a.m., when
she goes into the kitchen as regularly as a cuckoo clock, to
eight-thirty p.m. when she is all through and her kitchen looks like
a--well it's as clean and orderly as if no one was ever in it."
"Ten hours--that's fourteen."
"I know it, but she takes out four. She claims time to eat her meals."
"Preposterous!"
"Half an hour apiece, and half an hour in the morning to rest--and two
in the afternoon.
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