For a moment Effie looked hurt enough for tears. "Oh, Margery, how can you? And after all the years I've took care of you and loved you! You don't mean it, do you? You're not going to call your poor old Effie such an ugly name, are you?" "Well, I don't see why you talk that way, Effie. You are a hired girl, aren't you?" "Of course she's a hired girl," Willie Jones insisted. "And I'd just like to see any old hired girl of ours telling me what I dast do and what I dassent. Come on, Margery, we can't wait all day." [Illustration: "I'm only the hired girl!"] "Any old hired girl!" shouted Effie. She was angry now, so angry that Margery and Willie Jones retreated a few steps in case of personal violence. "So I'm like any old hired girl, am I? I'm only one of them good-for-nuthin' tramps that go traipsin' about from house to house and never keep a place for more than two weeks, am I? I'm a dirty, careless, ignur'nt hussy that's out all night and sleepy and lazy all day, am I? In other words, I'm a hired girl! Well, it's just what Tom's been tellin' me all along, and I didn't believe him. 'Nonsense,' says he, 'they don't care nuthin' for you. To them yir only a hired girl,' says he. 'Now come over to my place and I'll make you the housekeeper,' says he, 'and all you'll have to do is give your orders to the servants.' And every time I says to Tom, 'No, Tom,' I says, 'I'm not ready yet. I've been with these children since before they was born and I can't leave 'em yet. But thank you just the same,' I says. And Tom says, 'Effie, yir a born fool! What do you think them children care for you?' he says. 'Only what they can get out of you,' he says. And," concluded Effie, her voice again choked with tears, "I am a fool and Tom's right. They don't care nuthin' for me and I'm only the hired girl!" "Who's Tom, I'd like to know?" Willie Jones demanded offensively. "Who's Tom?" echoed Effie. It was plain that insult was being added to injury. "Why, Tom, me young friend, is Thomas McGinniss, Conthractor _and_ Builder, that built the house yir living in and every house on your street. And it's ten to one, me young gent, that yir own dad is still payin' his monthly installments to Tom McGinniss, brother of Effie the Hired Girl." Effie turned haughtily away, then paused to add: "If either of yez ever again have anything to say to Effie, when ye ring Mr. Thomas McGinniss's doorbell, ye had better mind yir manners and ask for Miss McGinniss." Effie slammed the kitchen door and Willie Jones showed how deeply impressed he was by putting his thumb on the end of his nose and wiggling his fingers in a manner that Margery had often been told was highly improper. "Well, come on," he said briskly. "It's time for us to be moving or we never will get two quarts picked."