e she despatched 'the male domestic of Mrs Boffin,'
in search of the counting-house of Chicksey Veneering and Stobbles, with
a message importing that if R. Wilfer could come out, there was a lady
waiting who would be glad to speak with him. The delivery of these
mysterious words from the mouth of a footman caused so great an
excitement in the counting-house, that a youthful scout was instantly
appointed to follow Rumty, observe the lady, and come in with his
report. Nor was the agitation by any means diminished, when the scout
rushed back with the intelligence that the lady was 'a slap-up gal in a
bang-up chariot.'

Rumty himself, with his pen behind his ear under his rusty hat, arrived
at the carriage-door in a breathless condition, and had been fairly
lugged into the vehicle by his cravat and embraced almost unto choking,
before he recognized his daughter. 'My dear child!' he then panted,
incoherently. 'Good gracious me! What a lovely woman you are! I thought
you had been unkind and forgotten your mother and sister.'

'I have just been to see them, Pa dear.'

'Oh! and how--how did you find your mother?' asked R. W., dubiously.

'Very disagreeable, Pa, and so was Lavvy.'

'They are sometimes a little liable to it,' observed the patient cherub;
'but I hope you made allowances, Bella, my dear?'

'No. I was disagreeable too, Pa; we were all of us disagreeable
together. But I want you to come and dine with me somewhere, Pa.'

'Why, my dear, I have already partaken of a--if one might mention such
an article in this superb chariot--of a--Saveloy,' replied R. Wilfer,
modestly dropping his voice on the word, as he eyed the canary-coloured
fittings.

'Oh! That's nothing, Pa!'

'Truly, it ain't as much as one could sometimes wish it to be, my
dear,' he admitted, drawing his hand across his mouth. 'Still, when
circumstances over which you have no control, interpose obstacles
between yourself and Small Germans, you can't do better than bring a
contented mind to hear on'--again dropping his voice in deference to the
chariot--'Saveloys!'

'You poor good Pa! Pa, do, I beg and pray, get leave for the rest of the
day, and come and pass it with me!'

'Well, my dear, I'll cut back and ask for leave.'

'But before you cut back,' said Bella, who had already taken him by the
chin, pulled his hat off, and begun to stick up his hair in her old way,
'do say that you are sure I am giddy and inconsiderate, but have never
really sl