1895: From the Diary of Dorothy Blandy, Housekeeper
In service to Lord P——, Hertfordshire, 1891–1895
I kept the accounts for eleven years and I want it recorded that I kept them well.
The discrepancy—four thousand pounds over four years, which sounds a great deal when it is said quickly and sounds entirely reasonable when it is set against eleven years of eighteen-hour days and a wage whose inadequacy Lord P—— has never once considered addressing—was not theft in the spirit in which theft is generally understood. Theft is the taking of something from a person who will miss it. Lord P—— has not missed four thousand pounds because Lord P—— has forty thousand pounds a year and would not notice four thousand unless someone put it in front of him at breakfast with his name on it, which I was careful not to do.
What I took was adjustment. I adjusted the accounts to reflect the true cost of my labour, which the wages column had for eleven years failed to do. I did this through a system of fictitious invoices—fictional tradesmen of my own composition, men of business whose names I confess I enjoyed inventing—and I did it with a precision that Lord P—— might have appreciated had he ever looked at the figures, which he did not because I presented them at breakfast with the kedgeree.
The kedgeree was always excellent. I made sure of that. You can present a man with any document you like if the kedgeree is excellent, which is a principle of household management I commend to any housekeeper in a similar position.
I was sentenced to eighteen months. The judge described my conduct as a betrayal of trust, which I found interesting from a man who has presumably never been asked to trust a system that does not trust him back.
Lord P—— has a new housekeeper now. He pays her twice what he paid me, which I consider my most significant professional achievement.
I am comfortable in the retrospect. I would do it again more slowly.
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