"It's as much as a man's place is worth sometimes to accept the commission you're entitled to," the valet remarked. "Ah, but Danny's the boy!" the laundress responded, shrewdly. "It's too much he knows about Mrs. Playfair for him to lose the job; trust him for that! As long as he wants that place he can have it an' welcome; she won't never say nothin' to him." "Is she a widow or is she divorced, zis Mistress Playfair?" asked the French maid. "She's the wan an' the other," said the laundress, with a laugh. "Mr. Playfair, he took and died a week after the trial, barrin' a day." "What's this I 'ear about your Mr. Van Allen and Mrs. Playfair?" Parsons inquired. "Is there anything between them, do you think?" The whistle was heard again, and the cook passed before them with a saddle of mutton; and for the moment the valet's question remained unanswered. "Who is it they have to dinner, after all?" the laundress inquired. "There's our three and your lord and Miss Marlenspuyk and Mrs. Playfair--but that's sure only six. There was to be eight all out, I'm thinkin'. It's two more men they must have." "I heard his lordship say that he expected to meet the Lord Bishop of Tuxedo," the Englishman remarked. "And madame say zat ze judge would be here," said the French maid. "Judge Gillespie?" asked the valet, with a certain interest. "Yes," the Frenchwoman answered, "the Judge Gillespie. What does that make to you zat you jump like zat?" "Oh, nothin', nothin' at all," returned Parsons, settling himself back in his chair with a snigger. "Out with it!" cried the Irish girl. "Don't be grinnin' all night there like a stuck pig! Out with it--I see it's on the end of your tongue." "But yes--but yes," urged the maid, "what is it you have to laugh?" "Really," the valet began, "I don't know that I ought to say anything 'ere in this 'ouse, you know--house, I mean. But I 'ave been told that this 'ere Judge Gillespie is a very great friend of Mrs. Van Allen's. Mind, I don't say there's anything wrong in it, you know. I only tell you what I 'ave 'eard tell myself in society 'ere and there. You see this ain't the only 'ouse I visit in New York, not by a long shot it ain't. And knowin' I visit 'ere, why, naturally, you see, my other friends tell me the news, you know--the news about the goin's on 'ere, you know." The Irish laundress and the French maid looked at each other for a moment, and then both laughed. "It's not outside they get the first news, is it?" the laundress inquired. Apparently the maid was also going to make a remark, but she changed her mind as the cook again came to the dumb-waiter with the dish of little silver saucepans containing terrapin. The valet was somewhat puzzled by the failure of his two attempts to open the family cupboard of the host and hostess for an inspection of the skeletons it might contain. "I don't know how she has them seated at the table," Maggie declared.