“Let me make sure. You know what you’ve got to do. Turn all your pockets inside out, and leave ’em so!” cried the person of the house.

He obeyed. And if anything could have made him look more abject or more dismally ridiculous than before, it would have been his so displaying himself.

“Here’s but seven and eightpence halfpenny!” exclaimed Miss Wren, after reducing the heap to order. “Oh, you prodigal old son! Now you shall be starved.”

“No, don’t starve me,” he urged, whimpering.

“If you were treated as you ought to be,” said Miss Wren, “you’d be fed upon the skewers of cats’ meat;⁠—only the skewers, after the cats had had the meat. As it is, go to bed.”

When he stumbled out of the corner to comply, he again put out both his hands, and pleaded: “Circumstances over which no control⁠—”