“Or a backbiting profanian!” said a voice behind.
Thorsby turned quickly round, and exclaimed, “Oh, Betty Trapps, so you are there! eh?”
Betty had come in for a pie-dish from the great cupboard, and caught the fling at the Methodists just as she was going out.
“Ah! just in time, Betty,” said Thorsby. “I’ve got a pleasant anecdote for you.”
Betty was moving off, without deigning a reply, when Thorsby said—
“You know that your old acquaintance, Molly Ayre, is dead?”
“No,” said Betty, stopping at once. “No. Is it true?”
“True as gospel,” said Thorsby; “and I want to tell you her dying sayings.”
Betty was riveted to the spot by the news of Molly Ayre’s departure and her dying sayings, for she had a great veneration for dying sayings.
“Well,” said Thorsby, addressing the company at large, “you know that old Sam Ayre, as we familiarly call him, is a bag-hosier,—that is, he possesses a score of stocking-frames, employs as many stockingers, and brings in his hose to our warehouse. Molly, his wife, kept a little shop. They were both zealous Methodists, and Sam——”