"Th' ould buffalo over there showed us up to th' spare room,
thinkin' to be funny," she who was fated never to be our cook, went
on, "and if I wasn't in a daffy house and him nothin' but a bug
it's the weight of that chair he'd feel over his bald spot. Th'
ould goosehead, to set us down on th' porch and talk to us for an
hour about th' landshcape and th' atmusphere, and to ask me, a
respectable lady, what kind of exercise I was partial to! It's a
Hiven's own blessin' I didn't hand him a poke in th' slats, so it
is!"
Uncle Peter, with palpably assumed indifference, slid off the piano
stool and faded behind the furthermost window curtain, while I went
up to the belligerent visitor and said, "On your way, Gismonda; the
referee gives the fight to you; here's the gate receipts!"
With this I handed her a ten-spot which she looked at suspiciously
and said, "If ever I get that ould potato pounder over in New York
it's exercise I'll give him! Sure, I'll run him from th' Bat'hry
to Harlem widout a shtop for meals, bad cess to him!"
Having delivered this parting knock at Uncle Peter, the queen of
the kitchen flounced out of the house, followed by the younger one
who had played only a thinking part in the strenuous scene.
Aunt Martha still sat motionless in the chair, quite on the verge
of tears, when Clara J. went over to her and said, "Why didn't you
tell me you were going after servants, Auntie?"
"I wanted to surprise you," the old lady replied, plaintively.
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