Then Nancy committed herself to this sharp remark,
“I’m sure this house is damp!”
If anybody had told the Lady Henrietta on the previous day that she could fall asleep before two strange men of the farmer kind, she would have been justified in denying the proposition, but ’tis a fact that now she sat down, laid her head upon her hands, and was off into a nap. Whereon, it need not be said, Nancy fell asleep too, for Nancy knew her duty. Indeed, it may be said that Nancy was very considerably enjoying this comedy—in her way. However, she did not enjoy the horrid shake with which rough farmer Plunket woke her. Plunket, somehow, did not use quite so much violence in waking up Henrietta. Perhaps this was because Lionel quietly touched him on the arm. And—and perhaps the Lady Henrietta was more handsome than ever, with her eyes closed.
“Hullo—what are your names?” said rough farmer Plunket.
“Name—name,” said Henrietta, as though puzzled at that plain question. “Name, sir. Oh, I’m—I’m Martha, so please you.” And she made a bob curtsey.
“And I’m Betsy,” said Nancy, and she made a broken-backed curtsey.
“And not a bad name for a good girl is Betsy,” said farmer Plunket. “Betsy, put my cloak away.”
Which the indignant handmaiden did in the manner of the hat.
And then it was that Plunket proposed spinning. Why, neither of the girls knew a distaff from any other staff in the world. And then, surely, it would have been delightful to hear the great men direct the little women how to spin, still more delightful to see their great hands pressing the thin thread. But ah! nor one nor the other could have given the delight which the young farmer of the name of Lionel felt, when he found himself bending over the beautiful, delicate-handed servant, and actually touching those same delicate hands.
Br-r-r-r-r, br-r-r-r-r, br-r-r-r-r, went the wheels, the industrious wheels, and soon Martha was producing a highly creditable thread. Meanwhile, Nancy was making Plunket half wild, for her wheel kept flying first one way and then the other, and the flax got all manner of ways, the whole machinery looking as though in a fatal fit. Meanwhile, Martha was industriously spinning, and her young master as industriously praising her. At last Plunket got into a rage as Miss Betsy finally upset the wheel with a crash, and he was preparing to pounce upon her in the real old English middle age manner, when the spinster showed herself deft at running at least, and fled from the room, followed by Plunket, with threats of divers kinds.