“Eat it! of course I am—for dinner,” I replied. “Why, what on earth have you been doing with it? You have rolled it up, I suppose.”
“Oh! yes, mum,” she answered, “as nice and snug as ever you seed anything in all your life.”
“And you haven’t spared the jam—have you, simpleton?” I added.
“Oh! no, mum,” she returned; “I emptied the whole pot.”
“You’re sure you spread it on your crust an inch thick, now, as I told you?” I inquired; for I began to have my misgivings from the girl’s manner, that something or other was wrong.
“Certainly, mum,” she replied, “on the crust and on the crumb too; and, with many thanks to you, mum, I eat as many as four slices.”
“You eat my jam!” I screamed; “oh dear! you shameful wicked——! but what on earth has become of my beautiful dog in a blanket?”
“He’s all safe, mum,” she answered, alarmed at my manner; “he’s down stairs—I put him in the baby’s cradle.”
“In my sweet angel’s cradle!” I shrieked, and, saying no more, I rushed down stairs, when, sure enough, there I found that hairy brute of a Carlo of ours rolled up in one of the Witneys belonging to my baby’s bassinet, and, kicking away as if it were half stifled. “Oh, you good-for-nothing bit of goods!” I exclaimed—“how dare you, Emma, ever tell me such an abominable falsehood, as that you used to do a dog in a blanket every night at your last mistress’s!—oh! you wicked story, you!”
“I’m nothing of the kind, mum, and it’s the plain truth!” she answered, sobbing, “and you can go and ask Miss Mackay yourself, if I hadn’t to do her Italian greyhound up in flannel every evening before I went to bed.”