The privileged maid had read love stories from the time she was ten
years old up to the beginning of her affair with Diggs the butler. The
pleasant discovery that the mighty Diggs had taken a shine to her
quite destroyed all of her interest in romance as it is written. She
was not long in finding out that the people who write love-stories are
not to be depended upon for accuracy in the depiction of passion.
Diggs gave her an entirely new idea of manly devotion. Instead of
adhering to the well-known and well-preserved formulas set down by the
fictionists he behaved in a perfectly astonishing manner. He became
acutely bashful and apprehensive, so much so, in fact, that for a
while Melissa imagined that Mr. Bingle had given him notice because of
the mistletoe episode on Christmas Eve. The poor fellow seemed to be
dodging her all the time. And when she came upon him suddenly or
unexpectedly he always began winding his watch and talking about the
extraordinary resemblance she bore to a girl he had once known in
England. The shock, therefore, was tremendous when Diggs asked her if
she thought she could ever learn to care for him in THAT way. It was
almost a week before Melissa could think of an answer to this
astonishing question. It was "yes."

And so, having but recently suffered the surprise of her life, Melissa
rushed to the succour of young Frederick. She whispered words of
encouragement into the ear of the despairing youngster, and urged him
to stand by his guns.

"You never can tell what is going to happen," she said. "Look at me,
for instance. What could have been more miraculous than the thing that
happened to me, Freddie? Who could have ever dreamed of Mr. Diggs
falling in love with me? An important person like him falling heels