tler, his accent sharpening somewhat with his
self-induced rage. He almost pronounced it "owled." "Dingy, hi! Where do
you get that? At your convent, I suppose. And where is it worn? Show me
where it's worn."

He was coming to her reference to Cowperwood, but he hadn't reached
that when Mrs. Butler interfered. She was a stout, broad-faced woman,
smiling-mouthed most of the time, with blurry, gray Irish eyes, and a
touch of red in her hair, now modified by grayness. Her cheek, below the
mouth, on the left side, was sharply accented by a large wen.

"Children! children!" (Mr. Butler, for all his commercial and political
responsibility, was as much a child to her as any.) "Youse mustn't
quarrel now. Come now. Give your father the tomatoes."

There was an Irish maid serving at table; but plates were passed from
one to the other just the same. A heavily ornamented chandelier, holding
sixteen imitation candles in white porcelain, hung low over the table
and was brightly lighted, another offense to Aileen.

"Mama, how often have I told you not to say 'youse'?" pleaded Norah,
very much disheartened by her mother's grammatical errors. "You know you
said you wouldn't."

"And who's to tell your mother what she should say?" called Butler, more
incensed than ever at this sudden and unwarranted rebellion and assault.
"Your mother talked before ever you was born, I'd have you know. If it
weren't for her workin' and slavin' you wouldn't have any fine manners
to be paradin' before her. I'd have you know that. She's a better woman
nor any you'll be runnin' with this day, you little baggage, you!"

"Mama, do you hear what he's calling me?" complained Norah, hugging
close to her mother's arm and pretending fear and dissatisfaction.

"Eddie! Eddie!" cautioned Mrs. Butler, pleading with her husband. "You
know he don't mean that, Norah, dear. Don't you know he don't?"

She was stroking her baby's head. The reference to her grammar had not
touched her at all.

Butler was sorry that he had called his youngest a baggage; but these
children--God bless his soul--were a great annoyance. Why, in the name
of all the saints, wasn't this house good enough for them?

"Why don't you people quit fussing at the table?" observed Callum, a
likely youth, with black hair laid smoothly over his forehead in a long,
distinguished layer reaching from his left to close to his right ear,
and his upper lip carrying a short, crisp mustache. His nose was shor