“Then all I can tell you is this, Grace, you’re a fool, and don’t deserve a hard-working man as your father. Why, look at these items! I never saw anything like it. Robbery, sheer robbery! I don’t work to pay thieves. I must have this thing seen into.”
Anne suddenly burst out crying.
“There now, what’s the matter with you, girl? Mayn’t your father say a word when he’s robbed right and left?”
“It isn’t that, daddy; it isn’t that; it’s that I’m so—so dreadfully sorry.”
“There, now, poor little thing, we mustn’t make her unhappy on Christmas Eve, father. No bill is worth that.”
“You’re right, wife, of course, you’re right, but really such a thumping bill is enough to put any one into a fury. Well, now, you listen, girls. You’re a pair of young fools, and I’m very cross with you, but I’m not going to scold any more. What’s done is done, and spilt milk can’t get back into the jug. I’ll pay that thief’s confounded bill, but it will be the last thing I’ll ever get from her, and it will be the last thing you’ll ever get from her. You’d better tell her so, missis, when you’re writing. There; wait a minute till I get my cheque-book. I must have this off my mind, or I’ll be as cranky as a bear with a sore head during the whole of Christmas.” Dodd left the room.
Mrs. Dodd was looking over the enormous bill. “Really, girls,” she said, “it is scandalous, and you’ve got hardly anything to show for that money. Those muslin frocks are just pretty, no more; they haven’t a scrap of real lace on them. Of course one might pay any price for real lace, and I’ve a passion for it myself, but there isn’t a yard on those dresses, and I don’t like the green—crêpe de chine, you call it. It’s a very poor quality; expensive crêpe de chine is lovely stuff. Oh, and there are your little fur jackets; I don’t much care for them either. I think your father has a right to be angry, and as to those silk stockings, a dozen pairs each! Have you got as many black silk stockings, girls? I’d better speak to Dawson.”
“Oh don’t, mums, don’t!” whispered Grace; “we gave some of them away; only don’t tell daddy.”
Dodd re-entered at this moment with his cheque, which he tossed to his wife.
“How, Mary Anne,” he said, “get rid of that woman; that’s the very last straw of my money that she’ll see. ’Pon my word! ’pon my word!”