Furlong stared, and began a reply of "Weally, I _cawn't_ say that----"
When O'Grady gruffly broke in with, "You'd better ask him, does he love teetotum."
"I thought you could recommend me the best establishment in the metropolis, Mr. Furlong, for buying shuttlecocks," continued the lady, unmindful of the interruption.
"You had better ask him where you can get mouse-traps," growled O'Grady.
Mrs. O'Grady was silent, and O'Grady, whose rage had now assumed its absurd form of tagging changes, continued, increasing his growl, like a _crescendo_ on the double-bass, as he proceeded:--"You'd better ask, I think--mouse-traps--steel-traps--clap-traps--rat-traps--rattle-traps-- rattle-snakes!"
Furlong stared, Mrs. O'Grady was silent, and the Misses O'Grady cast fearful sidelong glances at "Pa," whose strange irritation always bespoke his not being in what good people call a "sweet state of mind;" he laid hold of a tea-spoon, and began beating a tattoo on the mantel-piece to a low smothered whistle of some very obscure tune, which was suddenly stopped to say to Furlong, very abruptly--
"Why, he certainly, as I conceive, pwactised, or I might say, in short--he--a--in fact----"
"Oh, yes," said O'Grady, cutting short Furlong's humming and hawing; "oh, yes, I know--diddled you."
Bang went the spoon again, keeping time with another string of nonsense. "Diddled you--diddle, diddle, the cat and the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon--who was there?"
"Phew!" ejaculated O'Grady with a doleful whistle; "Dick the devil! You are in nice hands! All up with us--up with us--
Up, up, up, And here we go down, down, down, down, derry down!
Oh, murther!" and the spoon went faster than before. "Any one else?"
"Bermingham!" reiterated O'Grady. "What business has he there, and be ----!" O'Grady swallowed a curse when he remembered he was a clergyman. "The enemy's camp--not his principles! Oh, Bermingham, Bermingham,--B_rim_magem, B_rum_magem, Sheffield, Wolverhampton--Murther! Any one else? Was Durfy there?"
"No," said Furlong; "but there was an odd pe'son, whose name wymes to his--as you seem fond of wymes, Mister O'Gwady."
"What!" said O'Grady, quickly, and fixing his eyes on Furlong; "Murphy?"
O'Grady gave a more doleful whistle than before, and banging the spoon faster than ever, exclaimed again, "Murphy!--then I'll tell you what it is; do you see that?" and he held up the spoon before Furlong, who, being asked the same question several times, confessed he _did_ see the spoon. "Then I'll tell you what it is," said O'Grady again, "I wouldn't give you _that_ for the election;" and, with a disdainful jerk, he threw the spoon into the fire, after which he threw himself back in his chair with an appearance of repose, while he glanced fiercely up at the ceiling, and indulged in a _very_ low whistle indeed. One of the girls stole softly round to the fire and gently took up the tongs to recover the spoon; it made a slight rattle, and her father turned smartly round, and said, "Can't you let the fire alone?--there's coal enough on it; the devil burn 'em all--Egan, Murphy, and all o' them! What do you stand there for, with the tongs in your hands, like a hairdresser, or a stuck pig? I tell you, I'm as hot as a lime-kiln; go out o' that."