"She is not my daughter," cried the lady; "thank Heaven I am spared that
disgrace. And from what hiding-place does she and her sire send me a
message?"

Dickory's face flushed.

"I bring no message from a hiding-place," he said, "nor any from your
husband. He went to sea in his ship, but Mistress Kate Bonnet left the
vessel before it sailed, and her clothes having been injured by water,
she sent me for what a young lady in her station might need, supposing
rightly that you would know what that might be."

"Indeed I do!" cried Madam Bonnet. "What she needs are the clouts of a
fish-girl, and a stick to her back besides."

"Madam!" cried Newcombe, but she heeded him not; she was growing more
angry.

"A fine creature she is," exclaimed the lady, "to run away from my
house in this fashion, and treat me with such contumely, and then to
order me to send her her fine clothes to deck herself for the eyes of
strangers!"

"But, young man," cried Newcombe, "where is she? Tell that without
further delay. Where is she?"

"I don't care where she is!" interrupted Madam Bonnet. "It matters not
to me whether she is in the town, or sitting waiting for her finery on
the bridge. If she didn't go with her father (cowardly sneak that he
is), that gives her less reason to stay away all night from her home,
and send her orders to me in the morning. No, I will have none of that!
If my husband's daughter wants anything of me, let her come here and ask
for it, first giving me the reason of her shameful conduct."

"Madam!" cried Newcombe, "I cannot listen to such speech, such--"

"Then stop your ears with your thumbs," she exclaimed, "and you will not
hear it."

Then turning to Dickory: "Now, go you, and tell the young woman who sent
you here she must come in sackcloth and ashes, if she can get them, and
she must tell me her tale and her father's tale, without a lie mixed up
in them; and when she has done this, and has humbly asked my pardon for
the foul affront she has put upon me, then it will be time enough to
talk of fine clothes and fripperies."

Newcombe now expostulated with much temper, but Dickory gave him little
chance to speak.

"I carry no such message as that," he said. "Do you truly mean that you
deny the young lady the apparel she needs, and that I am to tell her
that?"

"Get away from here!" cried Madam Bonnet, with her face in a blaze. "I
send her no message at all; and if she comes here on her knees, I shall
spur