“We told you, Mrs. Allanby, what a pucker we were in about getting our dresses made. Before we left the tavern, we went to Mrs. Scrooge’s room—the old lady, you remember, that took us to the auction; and she let us know how we might snap our fingers at the mantua-makers. She said there were women that go out sewing by the day, and that by hiring one of them, and helping along with the easy parts ourselves, we might have our dresses made for little or nothing. At the hotel we couldn’t have done it, for paying board for a seamstress would have been but a poor speculation; but now that we are in a private family visiting, there would be some sense in it. I dare say she could sit in one of our sleeping-rooms, and the little one woman would eat couldn’t be of much consequence to you.” “I do not know where such a person could be found,” said I. “Oh, that is all settled already. Mrs. Scrooge is to call for us to go to a second-hand furniture store this morning, and she promised that she would take us to a seamstress that goes out for thirty-one cents a-day.” Again I succumbed to my inability to say “no.” Mrs. Scrooge did call—a vinegar-faced old lady, with a voice sharp enough to have given one an ear-ache; and I learned that the seamstress was engaged, though she could not come until the latter end of the week. The next day Mrs. Scrooge came again, and my trio departed to a second auction. The result of this expedition was another load of furniture, driven up to the door in the middle of the day. The first article discharged was a sideboard, capacious enough, almost, to serve as a pantry, with broken locks and an impaired foot, which fell off in the difficult descent of the main body from the wagon; then came a dressing-bureau, of scarcely smaller dimensions, with defective knobs and a low, distorted glass; and, lastly, a wash-stand, with a cracked marble slab. Mrs. Dilberry stood on the front steps, superintending their passage into the house, and giving orders at the top of her voice, when I ran out to protest against their being carried up stairs, which she was directing—the broken wall of the entry serving as a warning to me—and to propose their being stored in the wash-house. Whilst I was endeavoring to make myself heard, my husband, with a wondering countenance, presented himself before me. In my joy I dragged him into the first room, and shut the door. “My dear Mary,” said he, “I was not right certain whether it was proper for me to come into my own house—what is the meaning of this commotion?”