“He had his peculiarities, and 'oo hasn't, I say? Now, my wages when I came to him was just fourteen pounds, and they're just fourteen yet; but every Christmas, for many a year, master slipped a ten-pound note into my hand. 'Put that into your bank, Maria,' he would say, 'and never tell anybody you've got it.'
“As for food, he was aggravatin', for he would have nothing as was not plain, and he would check the books to a ha'penny; but if you was ill, why, he would bring home grapes with his own hand. We dare not for our lives give a morsel to beggars at the door, but if he heard of a poor family, nothin' would serve him but he would go and find out all about them.”
“That's my Dodson, just as I imagined him,” cried Mr. Greatheart; “tell me more, Maria; it's excellent, every word.”
“Do you think he would let any person know he was givin' help? Not he; and he was artful, was master. Why, I've known him send me with money to a clergyman, that he might give it, and his words were, 'No name, Maria, or we part; just a citizen of Liverpool.'”
“Dodson all over! shrewd and unassuming, and full of charity. Have you anything else to tell, Maria?”
“Well, sir, I do not know for certain, and it was not for me to spy on my master, but I'm much mistaken if many a one in the better class was not the better of Mr. Dodson in their troubles.”
“How do you think that?” inquired Mr. Great-heart in huge delight “I've seen him read a letter maybe six times, and he would wipe his eyes through pleasure as I took it You wouldn't believe, maybe, as master could be like that”
“I do, Maria. I declare it's what I expected. And what then?”
“He would walk up and down the room, and speak to himself, and read another bit, and rub his hands...”
“I wish I had been there, Maria.”