“Yes, gimcracks of a sort—rather heavy, though, we find them,” said Fan, not stopping to translate. “If you’ll lend a hand, we’d get along better.”

“All right,” said I.

“Zey is kep’ in ze bockat,” remarked Mounseer, luckily indicating some pails in the corner by a gesture of his hand.

“Adoo, Pierre, I think we’d better alley,” remarked Fan. This, I must say, was the sort of French I liked.

“To nex’ time, my cabbage!” said Pierre.

Then while they were busy over the buckets I turned suddenly and beheld the engineer bestowing on Nellie an unmistakable kiss.

“Hallo!” I said.

“It’s only their foreign ways; like as if we was to shake hands,” cried Nellie, running forward and looking very rosy. “Come, catch a hoult on these pails, Dan’l; they’re main weighty for we maids.”

I did catch hold of a couple of pails, one in each hand, and found that the last part of Nell’s remark was true.

“Just feel the heft of un!” remarked Fanny.