"Sure, they've half an hour yet, the creatures," said Mrs. M'Evoy.
"They have, and maybe an hour before they have the pigs shunted," said James, re-entering with a plate of biscuits, adorned with pink and white sugar.
"Ah! what signifies half an hour here or there on this line!" said Dr. Hickey. "I'm told there was a lady travelling on it last week, and she had a canary in a cage, and the canary got loose and flew out of the window, and by George, the lady pulled the communication cord, and stopped the train!"
"Well, now, she showed her sense," said Mrs. M'Evoy, with an utterance slightly muffled in pink biscuit.
"She and the guard went then trying to catch the canary," continued Dr. Hickey, "and he'd sit till they'd get near him, and then he'd fly on another piece. Everyone that was in the train was hanging out of it, and betting on it, from one carriage to another, and some would back the lady and some would back the bird, and everyone telling them what to do."
"It's a pity you weren't in it," said Miss M'Evoy, "they'd have been all right then."
"It was that bare bit of bog near Bohirmeen," pursued Dr. Hickey, without a stagger, "not a tree in it. 'If he have a fly left in him at all,' says a chap out of a Third Smoker, 'ye'll get him in Mike Doogan's bush.' That was the only bush in the country."
"'Twas true for him," said James.
"Well, they got him in the bush," proceeded Dr. Hickey, "singing away for himself; but they had some trouble crossing the drains. I'm told the guard said the lady lepped like a horse!"
"You had it right, all to the singing," commented Mrs. M'Evoy, advancing as it were to the footlights. "I have the little bird upstairs this minute, and she never sang a note yet!"