“What do I think of it, Ebner?” she replied nervously. “Why, I never heard of such a thing. Why, why, Mr. Lamont would be insulted. Why, he’d never call on girlie again.” She looked at him with the set expression of a small owl defying a hawk.
“Insulted, would he!” he broke out. “What’s he got to be insulted about? Ain’t I offerin’ him a fair price? Ain’t I? You can bet your life I am. There ain’t no man yet that ever got insulted over five per cent. Know what it means? Course you don’t, or you wouldn’t talk like you’re doin’. Figger it out for yourself. Them fashionable women send more clothes to the wash in a week than some women do in a month. Think they’re going to stop at an extry handkerchief? Not much. Reg’lar extravagance with ’em. They got tasty, dainty things by the dozens. Take the shirt-waists and the summer dresses alone. You’ve seen yourself how business has improved lately, ain’t you?” He nodded significantly to the new clock on the mantel, and glanced likewise at the new gilt chair with a hurt expression, as if neither had been really appreciated. “There’s your new bonnet, and your new dress, too, and there’s plenty more comin’ where they came from, little woman.”
She walked over to him and put her short, fat arms about his gaunt, red neck, begging him tearfully to forgive her.
“There! I shouldn’t have said a word,” she declared, wiping her eyes. “Only I’ve got daughter’s welfare to think of. And, oh, Ebner, you can’t understand, but think of what Mr. Lamont’s friendship may mean to her. Think of the entrée into society he can and will give her. I’m just as sure of it as my name’s Emma Ford. He’d never in the world agree to such a thing. He’s too much of a swell—holds his head too high, dear.”
“There you go again,” he blurted out, pacing around her, his thumbs in the armholes of his fancy waistcoat. “I’ve a good mind to see him now and have a plain talk with him. He won’t refuse it, don’t you worry. He’d be a fool if he did.”
“Oh, please, Ebner, don’t,” she begged. “I’d—I’d be mortified to death.”
“Won’t cost him a cent, will it, to decide? Anyway,” he returned, softening a trifle, “he can think the thing over, can’t he?”
She did not reply.
“Can’t he?” he insisted.
She subsided meekly on the sofa.