have my money!"

"Tush! Come to breakfast, Martha," said Mr. Pole. "You shall have money,
if you want it; you have only to ask. Now, will you promise to be quiet?
and I'll give you this money--the amount you've been dreaming about last
night. I'll fetch it. Now, let us have no scenes. Dry your eyes."

Mr. Pole went to his private room, and returned just as Mrs. Chump had
got upon a succession of quieter sobs with each one of which she
addressed a pathetic roll of her eyes to the utterly unsympathetic ladies
respectively.

"There, Martha; there's exactly the sum for you--free gift. Say thank
you, and eat a good breakfast to show your gratitude. Mind, you take this
money on condition that you let the servants know you made a mistake."

Mrs. Chump sighed heavily, crumpling the notes, that the crisp sweet
sound might solace her for the hard condition.

"And don't dream any more--not about money, I mean," said Mr: Pole.

"Oh! if I dream like that I'll be living double." Mrs. Chump put her hand
to the notes, and called him kind, and pitied him for being the loser.
The sight of a fresh sum in her possession intoxicated her. It was but
feebly that she regretted the loss to her Samuel Bolton Pole. "Your
memory's worth more than that!" she said as she filled her purse with the
notes. "Anyhow, now I can treat somebody," and she threw a wink of
promise at Adela. Adela's eyes took refuge with her papa, who leaned over
to her, and said: "You won't mind waiting till you see me again? She's
taken all I had." Adela nodded blankly, and the next moment, with an
angry glance toward Mrs. Chump, "Papa," said she, "if you wish to see
servants in the house on your return, you must yourself speak to them,
and tell them that we, their master and mistresses, do not regard them as
thieves." Out of this there came a quarrel as furious as the ladies would
permit it to be. For Mrs. Chump, though willing to condone the offence
for the sum she had received, stuck infamy upon the whole list of them.
"The Celtic nature," murmured Cornelia. And the ladies maintained that
their servants should be respected, at any cost. "You, ma'am," said
Arabella, with a clear look peculiar to her when vindictive--"you may
have a stain on your character, and you are not ruined by it. But these
poor creatures..."

"Ye dare to compar' me--!"

"Contrast you, ma'am."

"It's just as imp'dent."

"I say, our servants, ma'am..."

"Oh! to the deuce with your 'ma'am;'