uncharitable to remember that last Christmas Eve she drank eleven cups of tea, and grumbled all the time. And she is not a grateful woman, Frank. You recollect her addressing a crowd outside this house, about her wrongs, when, one night after we had gone to bed, she brought back the petticoat of new flannel that had been given her, because it was too short.”
“That’s true,” said Mr. Milvey. “I don’t think that would do. Would little Harrison—”
“Oh, Frank !” remonstrated his emphatic wife.
“He has no grandmother, my dear.”
“No, but I don’t think Mrs. Boffin would like an orphan who squints so much .”
“That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey, becoming haggard with perplexity. “If a little girl would do—”
“But, my dear Frank, Mrs. Boffin wants a boy.”
“That’s true again,” said Mr. Milvey. “Tom Bocker is a nice boy,” (thoughtfully).
“But I doubt , Frank,” Mrs. Milvey hinted, after a little hesitation, “if Mrs. Boffin wants an orphan quite nineteen, who drives a cart and waters the roads.”
Mr. Milvey referred the point to Mrs. Boffin in a look; on that smiling lady’s shaking her black velvet bonnet and bows, he remarked, in lower spirits, “that’s true again.”
“I am sure,” said Mrs. Boffin, concerned at giving so much trouble, “that if I had known you would have taken so much pains, sir—and you too, ma’am—I don’t think I would have come.”