COMMUTER'S WIFE 277 



when you reaches out the 'elpin' 'ands, it's not me 

 nor you can tell if it's a kiss or a knife they'll meet. 



" What does concern me is this, the seein' you 

 inconvenienced by changes in hot weather, Mrs. 

 Evan. Delia should give her proper month's 

 warning, but instead she's took her bank-book 

 and gone down to the priest to get him to speak 

 with Patrick and hurry the wedding without the 

 calling of banns, if it may so be. 



" Now, Mrs. Evan, Timothy Saunders's sister's 

 girl, Effie, is leaving service in Canada and is 

 looking to crossing to the States, having written 

 her uncle to speak for her where he is acquainted. 

 Which same I bid him do, but he being so back- 

 ward, I'll venture it for him, that you might try 

 her, the same making less of a mixed family, you 

 know, ma'am." 



I assented, thanked Martha, and she departed. 

 As the luncheon was a cold one, it had not suffered 

 by delay. An egg and lettuce salad, waferlike 

 sandwiches of ham and chicken, strawberries 

 heaped on their own leaves, hulls on, with sugar 

 to dip them in, and a glass of milk. As I ate 

 leisurely, thinking of Delia the while, Bluff came 

 up for crusty bits, as a matter of course, but The 

 Orphan seated himself at a distance and sniffed 



