nd
self-possession: "That's what ye're after thinkun', Mary; but I
haven't got annything to do with what ye're after thinkun'. All I
wannt to know is what this mahn meant by preshumin' to speak to a lady
he didn't know, and takun' her for a cuke." To Roberts: "Will ye tell
me that, ye--"

Roberts, in extreme embarrassment: "Yes, yes, certainly; I shall be
very glad to explain, if you'll just step here to the corner. We're
attracting attention where we are--"

McIlheny: "Attintion! Do ye suppose I care for attintion, when it's me
wife that's been insulted?" He follows Roberts up, with Mrs. McIlheny,
as he retires to the corner where she had been sitting, out of the way
of the people coming and going. Campbell, after a moment, closes his
magazine, and joins them.

Roberts: "Insulted? By no manner of means! Nothing was further from my
thoughts. I--I--can explain it all in a moment, my dear sir, if you
will have patience; I can indeed. I have the highest respect for the
lady, and I'm quite incapable of offering her an affront. The fact
is--I hardly know how to begin--"

McIlheny: "Go ahn, sor; or I'll have to do the beginnun' meself,
pretty soon." He shifts himself from one foot to another with a
saltatory briskness.

Roberts: "The fact is, my wife had engaged a cook, up-town, and she
had sent her down here to meet me, and go out with me to our summer
place at Weston."

McIlheny: "An' fwhat has all that rigamarole to do wid your speakin'
to a lady ye'd never been inthrojuced to? Fwhat had yer wife's cuke to
do with Mrs. McIlheny?"

Roberts: "Why, I didn't know the cook by sight, you see. My wife had
engaged her up-town, and appointed her to meet me here, without
reflecting that I had never seen her, and wouldn't know who she was,
when I _did_ see her; she partly expected to be here herself, and so I
didn't reflect, either."

McIlheny, with signs of an amicable interest: "An' she lift ye to mate
a lady ye never had seen before, and expicted ye to know her by
soight?"

Roberts: "Precisely."

McIlheny, smiling: "Well, that's loike a wooman, Mary; ye can't say it
ain't."

Mrs. McIlheny, grinning: "It's loike a mahn, too, Mike, by the same
token."

McIlheny: "Sure it's no bad joke on ye, sor."

Campbell, interposing: "I was having my laugh at him when your good
lady here noticed us. You see, I know his wife--she's my sister--and I
could understand just how she would do such a thing, and--ah, ha, ha,
ha, ha!