"I've a mind to tell you something."
The company present pricked ears. Uncle smiled, drawing himself up, inflating his chest, quite ready for a preliminary spar.
"You tell it, my girl. 'Tis crool to think o' what wimmen-folk suffer from allers holding their tongues."
"Your tongue is too sharp. Mr. Saint is civil to you. Be civil to him. That's all."
She drew his ale, and handed it to him.
Uncle looked at her with twinkling eyes. She was making things easy for him, and he felt quite grateful to her. She had fired the first shot. This might or might not be used as a casus belli. He said, meaningly:
"Be that advice or a warning like?"
"Take it as both, Mr. Mucklow."
"I will. Now, tell me this, my girl; be you speaking for yourself, or for your master? If you be speaking for yourself, I be minded to tell 'ee that you be paid to serve customers, and not to improve their manners. If you be speaking for Willum Saint, I thanks you very kindly and passes no more remarks."
This, it will be admitted, was a crafty speech on Uncle's part, and pleased him mightily. The girl was sure to resent a rebuke before others, and already the gaffers were grinning at her. If she shifted responsibility to Saint Willum, a casus belli had been established. The young woman lacked Uncle's finesse. She answered sullenly: