He’d been in this fine house all of five days and not a soul had cuffed him or kicked him or even cursed him out. What more could a fellow expect from life than that? Not that the toffs and their strange ways didn’t take a bit of getting used to. Take the bathing, for instance. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear they was part fish the way they took to water. No sooner had he put a foot out of bed each morning than it was, “Wash your face and hands, Alfie,” like he’d spent the night sleeping in the gutter instead of between sheets smelling sweet as any flower in a Haymarket stall. Then come Saturday and like it or not, there was John Footman with his everlasting tub of hot water, and it was, “In you go, Alfie,” and next thing he knew, they was back to scrubbing the hide off him again. There was drawbacks to his fine new clothes as well. For before he could put on his britches of a morning, he must remember to pull on a pair of underdrawers—useless things and a waste of good money, if you asked him, for not a soul could see them.
