I agreed that it must have been a fine affair in its day.
“And the centre-table,” rejoined Esther Ann, “think of such a centre-table selling for fifteen dollars—pure mahogany! when it is varnished, and has a new castor, one being broken, it will be beautiful—or even if it were just rubbed up with oil and turpentine; indeed, for my part, I prefer second-hand furniture to new—it looks more respectable, as if we had it some time. Our old furniture at home I’m very proud of—no one that sees it can call us upstarts.”
“Yes,” added Mrs. Dilberry, “there’s the pyanna, and the book-case, and the pair of card-tables—”
“Don’t say upstarts, sister;” said Jane Louisa, hurrying to drown her mother’s voice; “I’m sure you know it is the fashion to call them parvenues!”
“Upon my word,” resumed the old lady, still see-sawing up and down on the sofa, to enjoy its springs, “it will make talk enough in Tarry-town, when we get home with such lots of stylish things; they’ll call us prouder than ever; but when people can be grand for quarter price, they’d be gumpies to let the chance slip through their fingers.”
Still the point that most concerned me, why they had been deposited in my charge, had not yet been broached, and I ventured to hint at it.
“Sure enough, we forgot to mention it;” said Mrs. Dilberry; “we could not take the things to the hotel, you know, so we told the men they might as well bring them here. I suppose they might be removed into the parlors at once.”
I remarked that my parlors were already as full of furniture as was desirable, and that their best plan would have been to have had them removed—at once to some cabinet-makers shop to be repaired, and boxed for transportation.
“That was what Mrs. Scrooge thought,” returned Mrs. Dilberry, “but we went to two or three shops and found they charged such different prices, that I made up my mind to wait, and go round to a dozen at least, till I could find out where the best bargain was to be made. So you may as well put them among your own things and have the credit of them till I can look about a little.”
I had no resource now but to send the chairs to the third story, the table to the dining-room, and to leave the sofa and piano where they stood. Whilst her possessions were being moved by the servants, Mrs. Dilberry ran about the house giving orders as if quite at home.