eats. Every time I handed him anything I looked
closeter and closeter. Them whiskers never grooved
on them cheeks, says I to myself. Them ’s
paper collars, says I. That dimun in your shirt-front
hain’t got no life to it, says I. I don’t
believe it’s nothiri’ more ‘n a
bit o’ winderglass. So says I to Pushee,
‘You jes’ step out and get the sheriff
to come in and take a look at that chap.’
I knowed he was after a fellah. He come right
in, an’ he goes up to the chap. ‘Why,
Bill,’ says he, ’I’m mighty glad
to see yer. We’ve had the hole in the wall
you got out of mended, and I want your company to come
and look at the old place,’ says he, and he pulls
out a couple of handcuffs and has ’em on his
wrists in less than no time, an’ off they goes
together! I know one thing about that young gentleman,
anyhow,—there ain’t no better judge
of what’s good eatin’ than he is.
I cooked him some maccaroni myself one day, and he
sends word to me by that Mr. Paul, ‘Tell Miss
Miranda,’ says he, I that the Pope o’ Rome
don’t have no better cooked maccaroni than what
she sent up to me yesterday,’ says he.
I don’ know much about the Pope o’ Rome
except that he’s a Roman Catholic, and I don’
know who cooks for him, whether it’s a man or
a woman; but when it comes to a dish o’ maccaroni,
I ain’t afeard of their shefs, as they call
’em,—them he-cooks that can’t
serve up a cold potater without callin’ it by
some name nobody can say after ’em. But
this gentleman knows good cookin’, and that’s
as good a sign of a gentleman as I want to tell ’em
by.”
VI
Still at fault.
The house in which Maurice Kirkwood had taken up his
abode was not a very inviting one. It was old,
and had been left in a somewhat dilapidated and disorderly
condition by the tenants who had lived in the part
which Maurice now occupied. They had piled their
packing-boxes in the cellar, with broken chairs, broken
china, and other household wrecks. A cracked
mirror lay on an old straw mattress, the contents of
which were airing themselves through wide rips and
rents. A lame clothes-horse was saddled with
an old rug fringed with a ragged border, out of which
all the colors had been completely trodden. No
woman would have gone into a house in such a condition.
But the young man did not trouble himself much about
such matters, and was satisfied when the rooms which
were to be occupied by himself and his servant were
made decent and tolerably comfortable. During
the fine season all this was not of much consequence,
and if Maurice made up his mind to stay through the
winter he would have his choice among many more eligible
places.