He now presented himself in his own doorway, a hand on either side of the jamb, and bowed profoundly:
“Miss Flathers! Pleased to meet you! I see you still continue to favor yourself in looks. Lost your place, I suppose?”
“That's right, be insultin'!” Myrtella flared up haughtily; “throw it in my face that I'm hard to please, and ain't willin' to put up with any old place I come to.”
“Now I wouldn't put it that I was throwing it in yer face exactly,” began Phineas, anxious to propitiate.
“Which means I'm a story-teller?” Myrtella squared herself for action.
“Oh, come on along,” coaxed Phineas; “no harm's meant. Go on an' tell us what you left fer.”
“Who said I'd left? Puttin' words in my mouth I never thought of utterin'! I ain't left, and what's more I ain't going to. I got a good place.”
Phineas whistled an aggravatingly attenuated note of surprise: “The lady you are working for must be a deef-mute.”
“She is. The same as you'll be some day. She's been dead three years.”
The triumph with which she made this announcement put a momentary quietus on Phineas, and enabled her to proceed: