“Thrue, again, Masther,” she answered, with consummate impudence. “But, by my sowl, we are a warrm-hearted people, so we are; an’ when the blood’s up, Pat hasn’t time to be thinkin’ of thrifles.”
“Exactly so; and it is for that reason, Norah,” continued my husband, “that persons like ourselves are frightened to live in the same house with you.”
“Frighthined was it ye were saying,” she replied; “sure an’ if you’re good to us, don’t we take it to heart as warrmly as when ye trate us badly. But, by St. Pathrick, it’s the bad we forgit, and the good we remimber. Faith, an’ the masther hisself will say that!”
“I cannot deny it,” returned Edward; “and, indeed, it is solely on that account, Norah, that I speak to you in the temperate manner I am at present doing; for I know that it is the character of your nation to be touched by a kind word, while you are only enraged by a harsh one.”
“Faith, an’ that’s what we are,” cried the woman, who really looked as if she was going out of her wits on the spot. “An’ blessings on the masther who said that same. An’ by the powers, it isn’t Norah that’ll be the dirty blaggeard ever to lave him as long as she lives.”
“Yes, but, Norah,” returned my husband, with certainly more reason than I ever gave him credit for, “after your conduct to your mistress, I should be forgetting my duty to her, were I to consent to your remaining with me.”
“Och, murther!” she exclaimed, as cool as ever. “You niver mane to say that you’ll be afther driving Norah from your door?”
“Yes, Norah,” he answered, with a firmness that astonished me; “this day month, if you please! You can go down to your work again now.”
“Ah, niver say it—niver say it, honey,” she cried, with the tears starting in her eyes—“ah, niver say it. Only let Norah stop wid ye, and by St. Pathrick there’s nothing she’ll be thinking too good for ye. Sure, and wont she work night and day for ye both. Oh! spake a word to him, misthress, and say ye wont be after puttin’ my blood up agin, and I’ll be as kind and good to the pair of ye as if ye were my own dear childer.”
“No, Norah!” my husband replied; “it is useless to think that you and your mistress can ever live amicably together; and my mind is made up. So go down stairs quietly, like a good soul, and don’t let me hear anything more about it.”