"Two bottles!" a tiny voice suddenly piped from the depths of one of the velvet bundles. Chadwick's small head bobbed into sight. "Make it two! And make it snappy!"
Agatha's head was only a moment behind Chadwick's in making its appearance, "Sot!" she accused. "Greedy little pig!"
"You be still," Chadwick rejoined. "What if I do get a little drunk tonight? Who ever had a better reason? Just being married to you would be enough, I should think! I've got it coming to me."
"You've got a lot coming to you," Agatha shrilled. "And someday you're going to get it. If it hadn't been for you starting that fight up there...."
"Please," the infant Chadwick said, looking pained. "Try to restrain your shrewish tendencies just this once, won't you?" He turned to the liquor merchant with a bland smile. "Two bottles, if you please, friend."
"Yes," Toffee put in quickly, by way of ending the discussion. "Two bottles, if you please."
"Perhaps it's just as well," Agatha drawled. "I wouldn't drink from the same bottle with that little lush, anyway."
The merchant made a brief, strangling noise as he tore his eyes away from Agatha and Chadwick and backed into a shelf, upsetting several bottles onto the floor. "I shouldn't of nipped the stock in the back room," he muttered to himself. "Me old lady warned me this would happen. She said it would start just this way." He turned his back on Toffee and the infants, grasped the edge of the shelf and rested his head on the backs of his hands. A deep shudder ran the full length of his body. It was some time before he began to recover even a little bit.
Finally, without turning around, he managed to say, "What kind of whiskey did you want, lady?"