"You wait!" I cried. My tone was not too confident, for in a second's rapid survey I could not see the how or the wherewithal of obtaining sweets to fling at Susan. It must however have been confident enough to inspire her with a lively sense of joys to come.
"I didn't mean nort. Only my li'l joke. Have a lollipop—or two."
On the way home I left Marcus Browning in silence, and evolved plans. Suppose I were to ask Aunt Jael to give me a penny! My heart beat at the thought. I rehearsed to myself my opening "Please Aunt Jael" a score of times. Such rehearsings, inspired by my timidity, served always to increase it. Then I remembered a bottle of acid-drops in the medicine cupboard in the bedroom. Dare I beg a few? Or take a few? suggested the Tempter, take being His pretty word for steal. This was the easier plan, but I shunned its dishonesty. I would ask her first. Or ask even for the penny, I decided, if at the moment I found courage enough.
All the way through dinner I put off making my appeal. Several times I moistened my lips and came to the very brink, where the glimpsed precipice of Aunt Jael's wrath drove me back. Yet brave the precipice I must, or tumble into the abyss of Susan's scorn on the morrow.
At last I blundered in, heart beating and face flushed: "Please may I have a penny?"
"A penny?"
"To buy some sweets."
"Highty-tighty! Don't you get enough to eat here? Never heard of such a thing. Your Grandmother and I never had pence for sweetmeats and such trash. Be off with you."
"But—"
"No buts here." The thorned stick stamped the floor. Grandmother concurred.