“I want a dozen Newyear cookies!” screamed the old creature.
The little man counted out twelve, as before.
“I want one more!” screamed she, louder than ever.
“Men weet hoe een koe een haas vangen kan!” cried the boss, in a rage; “den want will pe your masder.”
She offered him six stivers, which he indignantly rejected, saying,
“I want none of your duyvel's stuyvers—begone, duyvel's huysvrouw!”
The old woman went her way, mumbling and grumbling as usual.
“By Saint Johannes de Dooper,” quoth Boss Boomptie, “put she's a peaudy!”
That night, and all the week after, the brickbats flew about Knickerbocker Hall like hail, insomuch that Boss Boomptie marvelled where they could all come from, until one morning, after a terrible shower of bricks, he found, to his great grief and dismay, that his oven had disappeared; next went the top of his chimney; and when that was gone, these diabolical sinners began at the extreme point of the gable end, and so went on picking at the two edges downward, until they looked just like the teeth of a saw, as may be still seen in some of our old Dutch houses.
“Onbegrypelik!” cried Boss Boomptie, “put it's too pad to have my prains peat out wid my own prickpats.”