"Who've you brought home with you this time, Mandoline Rosenberg?" said she. "Take off your hat and hang it over them tommatuses; but mind yer don't drop it into that dish of lard."
"Mother," pleaded Mandoline, "we want to go up chamber to see my pretty things; her mother sent her a-purpose."
"No, she didn't; no such a thing! You're a master hand to pick up children and fetch 'em home here, and then crawl out of it by lying! Besides, you've got to knit. I must have those socks done by to-morrow noon, Mandy, or I'll know the reason why."
As Mrs. Rosenberg spoke, she pushed a waiter full of seeds under the stove as if she hated the very sight of them; and when she stood up again, Dotty observed that her dirty calico dress did not come anywhere near the tops of her calf-skin shoes.
"But, mother," said Mandoline, with a winning smile, "this is Dotty
Dimple, the little girl that gave me the needle-book."
This was partly true. Dotty had given Mandoline an old needle-book; but it had been in return for some maple sugar, which the little Jewess had pilfered from her father's store.
"Dotty Dimple, is it?" said Mrs. Rosenberg, with a sharp look at the little guest.
"I don't know now any better than I did before. That's a name for a doll-baby; I should say."
"Alice Parlin, mother."
"Is it? O, well; you may take her up stairs out of my way; but mind, you must knit every minute you're gone."