"How could we know what you 'eard her say?" the valet responded, impatiently.
"Sure, amn't I tellin' ye?" the Irish girl returned. "She was talkin' to the bishop, and she says, says she. 'The judge is a better man than you, bishop,' she says, 'leastwise he makes more people happy,' she says. 'How so?' says the bishop, says he. 'This way,' she says; 'when you marry a couple you make two people happy,' she says, 'an' when the judge divorces a couple he makes four people happy,' she says. Miss Ethel and the old lady with the white hair, they said nothin', but the rest of them laughed."
What further fragments of the conversation at the dinner-table up-stairs Maggie had been able to gather during her brief visit to the butler's-pantry could not then be made known to the other domestics, for Tim came slouching into the sitting-room.
"Say, Maggie," he began, "didn't you hear that ring at the bell? That's your feller—I seen him. He's out at the gate now."
"Is it the letter-man you mean?" asked Maggie, adjusting her hair as she passed the looking-glass.
"Ah, go on," returned Tim, impatiently, "what t'ell are you givin' us? How many fellers do you want, say?"
After Maggie had chased Tim out of the room, the Swedish cook went to the dumb-waiter once more to send up the four smoking canvas-backs that lay luxuriously on their cushions of fried hominy.
The French maid and the English valet continued to chat, discussing chiefly the personal peculiarities of the members of the households in which they had served. His former masters Parsons was willing enough to find fault with, but Lord Stanyhurst he seemed to think it a point of honor to defend. Mrs. Van Allen the Frenchwoman had no high opinion of, nor of Mr. Kortright Van Allen; but of their daughter, Miss Ethel Van Allen, she could not say too much in praise.
"I told that wild Irish girl that the marriage was arranged," said Parsons, "and I'm sure I 'ope so with all my heart, for 'is lordship needs money badly—I don't mind tellin' you, mam'zelle, 'e 'asn't paid me my wages this six months, not that I'd demean myself by askin' for them. But is it really settled, after all?—that's what I'd like to know."
"I zink so," the Frenchwoman responded; "you see, mademoiselle is not happy here. Monsieur and madame are at drawn knives. Zey have not spoken since two years."