abrupt in your questions? Suppose we change the subject. You seem to
have tamed this tiger until it obeys you like a kitten."

"That's what I get my wages for. But why do you think I'm an odd sort
of chauffeur?"

"For that matter, then, why do you think I'm an odd lady's-maid?"

"As to that, probably I'm no judge. I never talked to one except my
mother's, and she--wasn't at all like you."

"Well, that proves my point. The very fact that your mother _had_ a
maid, shows you're an odd sort of chauffeur."

"Oh! You mean because I wasn't always 'what I seem,' and that kind of
_Family Herald_ thing? Do you think it odd that a chauffeur should be by
way of being a gentleman? Why, nowadays the woods and the story-books
are full of us. But things are made pleasanter for us in books than in
real life. Out of books people fight shy of us. A 'shuvvie' with the
disadvantage of having been to a public school, or handicapped by not
dropping his H's, must knock something off his screw."

"Are you really in earnest, or are you joking?" I asked.

"Half and half, perhaps. Anyway, it isn't a particularly agreeable
position--if that's not too big a word for it. I envy you your
imagination, in which you can shut yourself up in a kind of armour
against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune."

"You wouldn't envy me if you had to do Lady Turnour's hair," I sighed.