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very nice with her. He told her all that went on in his office,
repeating for her a smart answer which he had made to the manager.
Maria did not understand why Joe laughed so much over the answer he had
made but she said that the manager must have been a very overbearing
person to deal with. Joe said he wasn’t so bad when you knew how to
take him, that he was a decent sort so long as you didn’t rub him the
wrong way. Mrs Donnelly played the piano for the children and they
danced and sang. Then the two next-door girls handed round the nuts.
Nobody could find the nutcrackers and Joe was nearly getting cross over
it and asked how did they expect Maria to crack nuts without a
nutcracker. But Maria said she didn’t like nuts and that they weren’t
to bother about her. Then Joe asked would she take a bottle of stout
and Mrs Donnelly said there was port wine too in the house if she would
prefer that. Maria said she would rather they didn’t ask her to take
anything: but Joe insisted.

So Maria let him have his way and they sat by the fire talking over old
times and Maria thought she would put in a good word for Alphy. But Joe
cried that God might strike him stone dead if ever he spoke a word to
his brother again and Maria said she was sorry she had mentioned the
matter. Mrs Donnelly told her husband it was a great shame for him to
speak that way of his own flesh and blood but Joe said that Alphy was
no brother of his and there was nearly being a row on the head of it.
But Joe said he would not lose his temper on account of the night it
was and asked his wife to open some more stout. The two next-door girls
had arranged some Hallow Eve games and soon everything was merry again.
Maria was delighted to see the children so merry and Joe and his wife
in such good spirits. The next-door girls put some saucers on the table
and then led the children up to the table, blindfold. One got the
prayer-book and the other three got the water; and when one of the
next-door girls got the ring Mrs Donnelly shook her finger at the
blushing girl as much as to say: O, I know all about it! They
insisted then on blindfolding Maria and leading her up to the table to
see what she would get; and, while they were putting on the bandage,
Maria laughed and laughed again till the tip of her nose nearly met the
tip of her chin.

They led her up to the table amid laughing and joking and she put her
hand out in the air as she was told to do. She moved her hand about
here and there in the air and descended on one of the saucers. She felt
a soft wet substance with her fingers and was surprised that nobody
spoke or took off her bandage. There was a pause for a few seconds; and
then a great deal of scuffling and whispering. Somebody said something
about the garden, and at last Mrs Donnelly said something very cross to
one of the next-door girls and told her to throw it out at once: that
was no play. Maria understood that it was wrong that time and so she
had to do it over again: and this time she got the prayer-book.
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