Oh, it's a burning shame! Why couldn't he have put her in a Home?"

"My dear, that would publish his disgrace to the world. He has chosen the one polite and irreproachable way of getting rid of her . . . without a scandal."

"You mean . . .? But surely she won't be able to get it on board ship?"

"If you think that, Mary, you still know next to nothing of the tricks a tippler is up to!" -- And how right he was, was shewn when the cook, in turning out the spare room, came upon a regular nest of bottles -- empty medicine bottles, the dregs of which bespoke their contents -- tucked away inside the first bend of the chimney.

Mary wrote to Mr. Henry informing him of Agnes's departure, also that the visit had passed off without contretemps: and shortly after, she received the gift of a photograph-album, bound in vellum and stamped in gold with her initials. It was a handsome and costly present. But Mahony waxed bitterly sarcastic over the head of it.

"An album! . . . a photograph-album! . . . as sole return for the expense we've been put to -- why, cab-hire alone must have run into pounds -- over his wife, whom we did not invite and had no wish to see. Not to speak of the strain the visit has been on you, my dear."

"But Richard, you wouldn't have had him send us money? -- ask for our bill?" Mary spoke heatedly to hide her own feelings, which were much the same as his. Richard singled out cab-fares; but these were but one item of many. In the course of a long day's shopping Agnes and she had needed lunch and refreshment -- manlike he no doubt imagined them living on air! -- and not infrequently Agnes had fancied some article in a shop where no account was run: none of which extras had been mentioned to him. The truth was, what with this, that and the other thing, Mary had been forced to make a sad hole in her savings.

"We certainly don't need Ocock's assistance in going down-hill," was Richard's parting shot.

It was true, a very hearty note accompanied the album; the pith of which was: If at any time, my dear Mrs. Mahony, an opportunity to return your great kindness to my dear wife should arise, I trust you will let me hear of it.

I.iv.

TO-MORROW was the Dumplings' birthday, and they were having a big party. But it was his, Cuffy's, party, too; for when he had first got six, they didn't have a house yet, and there was no room for a party. It was really most his, 'cos he was the oldest: his cake would be six storeys high, and have six lighted candles round it, and his chair be trimmed with most green leaves. Mamma said he might cut the cake his very own self, and make the pieces big or little just as he liked. She stopped in the kitchen all day, baking jam tarts and sausage-rolls, and men had taken the drawing-room carpet off and sprinkled the floor with white dust, so's you could slide on it.