“A gadder kin put more good t’ings to the bad in a three-minute round, than a draught horse could pull from here to the corner.”
Chip Nolan’s Remarks.
MRS. BURNS was bending over her washtub, placed upon a bench in the alley, taking the skin from her knuckles rubbing one of Tim’s red flannel shirts. It was wash day in Murphy’s Court and a network of clothes lines was strung from dwelling to stable, making a constant bending necessary to safe progress. Mrs. Nolan was hanging out her wash in her allotted space, her mouth stopped with clothes-pins and her skirts tucked up out of the damp; Mrs. McGonagle, who was making a social call, sat upon Mrs. Burns’ doorstep watching the efforts of her hostess across the drifting steam.
“Glory be!” exclaimed that lady, at length, pausing and wiping the perspiration from her face with one bleached and wrinkled hand, “the owld felly himself cud do nawthin’ wid it! Sure I’ve rubbed it, an’ I’ve b’iled it; I’ve bleached it, an’ I’ve got down on me two knees an’ scrubbed it, but sorra the cleaner it’ll git!”
“God love yez, avic, don’t I know,” said her caller. “Faith Goose gits his shirts in sich a state from his bit av work, that the washin’ fair takes me breath from me.”
“An’ it’s Murphy’s wash I’ll have till do after me own,” said Mrs. Burns, grappling once more with the labor at hand, half hidden in the thick cloud of steam. “It’s a-most dead I’ll be afore noight.”
Mrs. Nolan flung a bedspread to the breeze and clamped it down with pins.
“How is Mary gittin’?” inquired she.
“About the same,” answered Mrs. Burns. “Poor sowl; she’s failin’ fast.”
“Tis a sin an’ a shame till hark till the cacklin’ that do be goin’ aroun’ about her,” said Mrs. McGonagle. “Thim Kelly’s is spalpeens, so they are!”