"Oh, you cruel, cruel boy, to say I am a disagreeable wife!"
"Now, my dear Dora, you must know that I never said that!"
"You said I wasn't comfortable!"
"I said the housekeeping was not comfortable!"
"It's exactly the same thing! and I wonder, I do, at your making such ungrateful speeches. When you know that the other day, when you said you would like a little bit of fish, I went out myself, miles and miles, and ordered it to surprise you."
"And it was very kind of you, my own darling; and I felt it so much that I wouldn't on any account have mentioned that you bought a salmon, which was too much for two; or that it cost one pound six, which was more than we can afford."
"You enjoyed it very much. And you said I was a Mouse."
"And I'll say so again, my love, a thousand times!"
I said it a thousand times, and more, and went on saying it until Mary Anne's cousin deserted into our coal-hole and was brought out, to our great amazement, by a picket of his companions in arms, who took him away handcuffed in a procession that covered our front garden with disgrace.
"I am very sorry for all this, Doady. Will you call me a name I want you to call me?"