It was the Slabberts with Emigration Jane.
"Ho! So you can talk English a bit—give you a charnce?"
"Ja, a little now and then when it is useful. But when we are to be married, you shall only to me talk in my own moder Taal."
"Shan't I myke a gay old 'ash of it!" Recklessly she crushed the large hat against the unwieldy shoulder. "There, good-night agyne, deer! Sister Tobias—that's what they call the one that 'ousekeeps and manages the kitchen—Sister Tobias 'll be sittin' up for me, thinkin' I've got meself lost or bin run away with." She gurgled enjoyingly.
"Tell me again, before you shall go, about the Engelsch Commandant who came to visit at the Convent to-day?"
"Lor! 'Aven't I told you a'ready? 'E stopped 'arf an 'our or more ... an' She—that's the Reverend Mother, as they call her—She took 'im over the 'ouse, an' after 'e'd gone through the 'ouse, an' Sister Tobias—ain't that a rummy name for a nun?—Sister Tobias, she showed 'im to the gyte, an' 'e says to 'er as wot 'e's goin' to 'ave the flagstaff rigged up in the gardin fust thing to-morrow mornin', an' 'e'll undertake that the workin'-party detached for the purpose will know 'ow to be'ayve theirselves respectful. An' then 'e touches 'is 'at an' gets on 'is 'orse an' ..."
"Listen to me." The Slabbertian command of that barbaric language of the Englanders evoked her surprise, but the painful squeeze he gave her arm compelled attention. "Next time the English Commandant to the house shall come, you to listen at the keyhole is."
"For what have you before at keyholes listened, little fool?"
"To find out when they was goin' to sack me, so's to git me own notice in fust—see? Then you can say to the lydy at the Registry Office—and don't they give theirselves hairs!—as wot you're leaving because the place don't suit. Twiggy?"