“I think——­”

“God bless us!” ejaculated the servant, starting and turning a comely dirty face toward Marian.

“Did I frighten you?” said Marian, herself startled by the exclamation.

“You put the life acrass in me,” said the servant, panting, and pressing her hand on her bosom.

“I am sorry for that.  I was going to say that I think you need not take any further trouble with the fire.  It will light of itself now.”

“Very well, miss.”

“What is your name?”

“Liza Redmon’, miss.”

“I should like some light, Eliza, if you please.”

“Yis, miss.  Would you wish to take your tay now, miss?”

“Yes, thank you.”

Eliza went away with alacrity.  Marian put off her bonnet and furs, and sat down before the fire to despond over the prospect of living in that shabby room, waited on by that slipshod Irish girl, who roused in her something very like racial antipathy.  Presently Eliza returned, carrying a small tray, upon which she had crowded a lighted kerosene lamp, a china tea service, a rolled-up table cloth, a supply of bread and butter, and a copper kettle.  When she had placed the lamp on the mantelpiece, and the kettle by the fire, she put the tray on the sofa, and proceeded to lay the cloth, which she shook from its folds and spread like a sail in the air by seizing two of the corners in her hands, and pulling them apart whilst she held the middle fold in her teeth.  Then she adroitly wafted it over the table, making a breeze in which the lamp flared and Marian blinked.  Her movements were very rapid; and in a few moments she had arranged the tea service, and was ready to withdraw.

“My luggage will be sent here this evening or to-morrow, Eliza.  Will you tell me when it comes?”

“Yis, miss.”

“You know that my name is Mrs.  Forster, do you not?”

“Mrs. Forster.  Yis, miss.”

Marian made no further attempt to get miss changed to maam; and Eliza left the room.  As she crossed the landing, she was called by someone on the same floor.  Marian started at the sound.  It was a woman’s voice, disagreeably husky:  a voice she felt sure she had heard before, and yet one that was not familiar to her.

“Eliza.  Eli-za!” Marian shuddered.

“Yis, yis,” said Eliza, impatiently, opening a door.

“Come here, alanna,” said the voice, with mock fondness.  The door was then closed, and Marian could hear the murmur of the conversation which followed.  It was still proceeding when Mrs. Myers came in.

“I didnt ought to have left you to find your way up here alone, Mrs. Forster,” she said; “but I do have such worry sometimes that I’m bound to leave either one thing or another undone.”

“It does not matter at all, Mrs. Myers.  Your servant has been very attentive to me.”

“The hired girl?  She’s smart, she is—­does everything right slick away.  The only trouble is to keep her out of that room.  She’s in there now.  Unless I am always after her, she is slipping out on errands, pawning and buying drink for that unfortunate young creature.”