“Yais, but you do not go to throw it to a man like that, Madame Downes.”
“Hear, hear!” said the butler, and there was a chorus of approval.
“I say it is disgust—disgrace,” continued Mademoiselle Justine. “The girl is mad, and should be sent home to the bon papa down in the country.”
“I have a heart of my own,” said Mrs Downes again. “Ah, you needn’t laugh, Mary Ann. Some people likes footmen next door.”
The housemaid addressed tossed her head and exclaimed, “Well, I’m sure!”
“And so am I,” replied the cook, regardless of the sneers and smiles of the rest of the domestics at the table. “As I said before, I have a heart of my own, and if some people follow the example of their betters,”—here Mrs Downes stared very hard at the contemptuous countenance of the French maid,—“and like the furren element, it’s no business of nobody’s.”
Madame Justine’s eyes flashed.
“Did you make that saying for me, Madame Downes?” she flashed out viciously.
“Sayings ain’t puddens,” retorted cook.
“I say, make you that vairy witty jeer for me?” cried Mademoiselle Justine viciously.