"He has not any fit to sit up in at home. Never mind, I'll manage that, Tilly."
"David, you tell me some of the things he wants, and I'll get Sarah Staples and her mother to make them."
"Well.—But I'll pay charges, Tilly; I don't believe you've got much in that little pocket of yours."
This consultation was private; and in private the new clothes for Joshua Binn were procured and got ready; very plain and coarse clothes, for David and Matilda were learning how much there was to do with their money. All this caused no remark, not being open to it. But when David took little Josh, wrapped up in an old cloak of his, and drove with him in a carriage to the station, and took the cars with him to Shadywalk, there was a general outcry and burst of astonishment and indignation. David was at breakfast the next morning as usual; and the storm fell upon him.
"I wonder how you feel this morning," said his grandmother, half in displeasure and half in sympathy; for David was a favourite.
"After travelling all night," added Mrs. Laval.
"Up to study, Davy?" asked Norton.
"I am so astonished at you, David, that I do not know how to speak," began his mother. "You—always until now a refined, gentlemanly boy,—you to turn yourself into a head hospital nurse, and Poor Society agent! travelling in company with the lowest riff-raff! I don't know what to make of you. Really, I am in despair."
"He always was a poke," said Judy; "and now he's a poor poke."
"It is too bad!" echoed Mrs. Laval; "though that isn't true, Judy."