and singing of midnight strains,
Under Bonnybell's window panes,--
Wait till you come to Forty Year!"

In one sense Margaret's husband _had_ come to forty year--she was forty
to a day.

Mrs. Margaret O'Rourke, with the baddish cat following close at her
heels, entered the Bilkins mansion, reached her chamber in the attic
without being intercepted, and there laid aside her finery. Two or three
times, while arranging her more humble attire, she paused to take a look
at the marriage certificate, which she had deposited between the leaves
of her Prayer-Book, and on each occasion held that potent document
upside down; for Margaret's literary culture was of the severest order,
and excluded the art of reading.

The breakfast was late that morning. As Mrs. O'Rourke set the coffee-urn
in front of Mrs. Bilkins and flanked Mr. Bilkins with the broiled
mackerel and buttered toast, Mrs. O'Rourke's conscience smote her.
She afterwards declared that when she saw the two sitting there so
innocent-like, not dreaming of the _comether_ she had put upon them,
she secretly and unbeknownst let a few tears fall into the cream-pitcher.
Whether or not it was this material expression of Margaret's penitence
that spoiled the coffee does not admit of inquiry; but the coffee was
bad. In fact, the whole breakfast was a comedy of errors.

It was a blessed relief to Margaret when the meal was ended. She retired
in a cold perspiration to the penetralia of the kitchen, and it was
remarked by both Mr. and Mrs. Bilkins that those short flights of
vocalism--apropos of the personal charms of one Kate Kearney who lived
on the banks of Killarney--which ordinarily issued from the direction of
the scullery were unheard that forenoon.

The town clock was striking eleven, and the antiquated timepiece on the
staircase (which never spoke but it dropped pearls and crystals, like
the fairy in the story) was lisping the hour, when there came three
tremendous knocks at the street door. Mrs. Bilkins, who was dusting
the brass-mounted chronometer in the hall, stood transfixed, with
arm uplifted. The admirable old lady had for years been carrying on
a guerilla warfare with itinerant venders of furniture polish, and
pain-killer, and crockery cement, and the like. The effrontery of the
triple knock convinced her the enemy was at her gates--possibly that
dissolute creature with twenty-four sheets of note-paper and twenty-four
envelopes for fifteen cents.