nderson, and a guileless purveyor of gossip, which rendered her
exceedingly entertaining. She sniffed meaningly now in response to
Mrs. Anderson's affirmative with regard to the identity of the recent
guests.

"They did not fail to eat enough," said she, presently, packing up
the plates and looking at her mistress, who was drying carefully a
pink-and-gold cup on a soft towel.

"Yes, they seemed to relish the food," responded Mrs. Anderson.

The maid sniffed again, and her sniff meant the gratification of the
cook who sees her work appreciated, and something else--an indulgent
scorn. "Well, I guess there is reason enough for them relishing it,"
said she.

Mrs. Anderson made a soft, interrogatory noise, all that was
consistent with her dignity and her sense of honor as a recent
hostess towards departed guests.

The maid went on. "They do say," said she, "them as knows, that them
Carrolls do not have enough to eat."

Mrs. Anderson made a little exclamation expressive of horror and pity.

"Yes, they do say so," the maid went on, solemnly. "They do say, them
that knows, that them Carrolls be owing everybody in Banbridge, and
have cheated folks that have trusted in them awful."

"Well, I am sorry if it is so," said Mrs. Anderson, with a sigh, "but
of course this young lady who was here to-night and her little
brother can't be to blame in any way, Emma."

The maid sniffed with a deprecating disagreement. "Mebbe they be
not," said she. She was rather a pretty girl, in her late girlhood,
thin and large-boned, with a bright color on her evident cheek-bones,
and with small, sparkling, blue eyes. She was extremely neat and
trim, moreover, in her personal habits, and to-night was quite
gorgeously arrayed in a light silk waist and a nice black skirt. She
was expecting her beau to take her to evening prayer-meeting. She was
a very religious girl, and had reclaimed her beau, who had had a
liking for the gin-mills previous to keeping company with her.

"Of course they are not," said Mrs. Anderson, with some warmth of
partisanship, remembering poor little Charlotte's pretty, anxious
face and her tiny, soft, clinging hands. She glanced, as she spoke,
at the maid's large, red-knuckled fingers with a mental comparison.

The maid was fixed in her own rendering of English verbs, and had
told her beau that her mistress did not speak just right, like most
old folks.

"Mebbe they be not," she said, with firm doubt. Then she added,