"Gettin' a new bedstead and fixin's for Sally Eldridge."
"I don't know what 'fixin's' are, in this connection," said the minister. "I have heard of 'light bread and chicken fixings,' at the South."
"The bread and the chickens are comin' too, for all I know," said the housekeeper. "I mean sheets, and coverlets, and pillows, and decent things. She hain't none now."
"I should think she would sleep better," said the minister, gravely.
"Had this child ought to spend her little treasures for to put that old house in order? It's just sheddin' peas into a basket that has got no bottom to it."
"So bad as that?" said the minister.
"Well, Mr. Richmond knows," the housekeeper went on, "there ain't no end o' the troubles there is in the world, nor yet o' the poverty; and Sally Eldridge, she'll be the better maybe, as long as the things last; but there's all the rest o' Lilac Lane, without speaking of what there is beside in Shadywalk; and the chilld 'll be without her dollars, and the world 'll be pretty much where it was."
"I don't see but that reasoning would stop my preaching, Miss Redwood."
"I don't mean it, sir, I'm sure."
"I don't think you mean what you say. What is the use of giving me a good cup of tea, when so many other people cannot have one at all?"