The Laughing Girl

"Only Thusis?"

"Only Thusis."

"You're – hum-hum! – very young, aren't you, Thusis?"

"Yes, I am."

"You cook very well."

"Thank you."

"Well, Thusis," I said, "I suppose when Mr. Schmitz engaged you to come up here, he told you what are the conditions and what vexatious problems confront me."

"Yes, he did tell me."

"Very well; that saves explanations. It is evident, of course, that if I am expected to board and feed any riff-raff tourist who comes to Schwindlewald I must engage more servants."

"Oh, yes, you'll have to."

"Well, where the deuce am I to find them? Haven't you any friends who would perhaps like to work here?"

"I have a sister," she said.

"Can you get her to come?"

"Yes."

"That's fine. She can do the rooms. Could you get another girl to wait on table?"

"I have a friend who is a very good cook – "

"You're good enough! – "

"Oh, no!" she demurred, with her enchanting smile, "but my friend, Josephine Vannis, is an excellent cook. Besides I had rather wait on table – with Monsieur's permission."

I said regretfully, remembering the omelette, "Very well, Thusis. Now I also need a farmer."

"I know a young man. His name is Raoul Despres."

"Fine! And I want to buy some cows and goats and chickens – "

"Raoul will cheerfully purchase what stock Monsieur requires."

"Thusis, you are quite wonderful."

"Thank you," she said, lifting her dark-fringed gray eyes, the odd little half-smile in the curling corners of her lips. It was extraordinary how the girl made me think of my photograph upstairs.

"What is your sister's name?" I inquired – hoping I was not consciously making conversation as an excuse to linger in my cook's kitchen.

"Her name is Clelia."

"Clelia? Thusis? Very unusual names – hum-hum! – and nothing else – no family name. Well – well!"

"Oh, there was a family name of sorts. It doesn't matter; we never use it." And she laughed.

It was not what she said – not the sudden charm of her fresh young laughter that surprised me; it was her effortless slipping from French into English – and English more perfect than one expects from even the philologetically versatile Swiss.

"Are you?" I asked curiously.

"What, Mr. O'Ryan?"

"Swiss?"

Thusis laughed and considered me out of her dark-fringed eyes.

"We are Venetians – very far back. In those remote days, I believe, my family had many servants. That, perhaps, is why my sister and I make such good ones – if I may venture to say so. You see we know by inheritance what a good servant ought to be."

The subtle charm of this young girl began to trouble me; her soft, white symmetry, the indolent and youthful grace of her, and the disturbing resemblance between her and my photograph all were making me vaguely uneasy.

"Thusis," I said, "you understand of course that if I am short of servants you'll have to pitch in and help the others."

"Of course," she replied simply.

"What do you know how to do?"

"I understand horses and cattle."

"Can you milk?"

"Yes. I can also make butter and cheese, pitch hay, cultivate the garden, preserve vegetables, wash, iron, do plain and fancy sewing – "

I suppose the expression of my face checked her. We both laughed.

"Doubtless," I said, "you also play the piano and sing."

"Yes, I – believe so."

"You speak French, German, English – and what else?"

"Italian," she admitted.

"In other words you have not only an education but several accomplishments."

"Yes. But in adversity one must work at whatever offers. Necessitas non habet legem," she added demurely. That was too much for my curiosity.

"Who are you, Thusis?" I exclaimed.

"Your maid-of-all-work," she said gravely – a reproof that made me redden in the realization of my own inquisitiveness. And I resolved never again to pry into her affairs which were none of my bally business as long as she made a good servant.