Be vewy quiet

Okay, this is so pathetic. I'm skulking around inside my house, not running water, not making a run for it, because my gardener is outside. My husband has been trying to reach the man to dismiss him (for cause), but he refuses to contact my husband and just keeps showing up. If I reveal my presence, it will be incumbent on me to fire him. Otherwise, I know that, when my husband finally speaks to him, he'll say something along the lines of, "But I saw your wife on Tuesday, and she never said anything...." So here I am, hiding in my house because revealing myself will put me between the rock (of firing the man to his face) or the hard place (of having my husband discover that I didn't fire him). Still, I cling to one principle: it's my husband's job to fire the people who work outside the house; inside is my domain, and I've politely dismissed more cleaning people than I care to think about. BTW, all this talk of gardeners and housekeepers makes me sound pretty snooty, doesn't it? In fact, the gardener is an imperative, because we can't maintain the property without help. As for the housekeepers, I manage on my own, since I long ago decided that the kids' private schooling is much more important to me than having someone labor in my house for my convenience. UPDATE: How's that for a regionalism? I say "gardner" so I spelled it "gardner." I've corrected that little problem. Sorry.