"I don't know my name rightly, sir, for I was stole by gipsies when I was but two days old."
The cobbler gave a cry and set down his glass. "Gipsies—two days' old—" he stammered. Then he pushed back the thick hair, about her ear. "Yes, yes!" pointing to a tiny slit in the lobe, "there is the very place,—where one of my jealous birds pecked her the day she was born!" He caught her in his arms and held her, mystified but happy—.
The reunion was interrupted by a pounding at the door. It was a furious Mary Ellen, her night out completely spoiled by the search for us.
Thus we were haled before Mrs. Handsomebody, questioned, upbraided, and given, at last, a bowl of hot gruel apiece.
"You deserve," she said bitterly, "to go empty to bed, but my conscience forbids that I relax my vigilance over your health. Tomorrow, we shall see what can be done in the way of discipline."
We sat on three high-backed haircloth chairs. The steaming gruel slipped thickly into our stomachs. The hot gin had gone to our heads. Mrs. Handsomebody's head looked abnormally large to me, and seemed to be whirling round and round. Surely she was not getting like the cobbler's wife! Mrs. Handsomebody was still scolding:
"You began the day by introducing a canary of the lowest proclivities into my case of stuffed birds, where he perpetrated irreparable damage—"
The Seraph interrupted, "Don't you yike live birds, Mrs. Handsomebody?"
"I prefer stuffed birds to live ones, I confess."
The Seraph said apologetically: "And I pwefer gin to gwuel—any day."