"No, I won't. I never pledge myself. I've been too often taken in. No offense. A man goes away and forgets. Send or bring the money, and the book is yours; or come to-morrow. I dare say it won't be gone. But I won't promise to keep it. There!" "Very well, I won't trouble you again in a hurry." "That is as you please, sir," said the bookseller, and no reply followed. "That's Mr. Worboise," said Mattie, "I wish father wouldn't be so hard upon him." "I don't like that young man," said Kitely, reëntering. "My opinion is that he's a humbug." "Miss Burton does not think so," said Mattie, quietly. "Eh, what, princess?" said her father. "Eh! ah! well! well!" "You don't give credit, Mr. Kitely?" said the tailor. "No, not to my own father. I don't know, though, if I had the old boy back again, now he's dead. I didn't behave over well to him, I'm afraid. I wonder if he's in the moon, or where he is, Mr. Spelt, eh? I should like to believe in God now, if it were only for the chance of saying to my father, 'I'm sorry I said so-and-so to you, old man.' Do you think he'll have got over it by this time, Spelt? You know all about those things. But I won't have a book engaged and left and not paid for. I'd rather give credit and lose it, and have done with it. If young Worboise wants the book he may come for it to-morrow." "He always pays me--and pleasantly," said Spelt. "Of course," said Mattie. "I don't doubt it," said her father; "but I like things neat and clean. And I don't like him. He thinks a deal of himself." "Surely he's neat and clean enough," said Spelt. "Now, you don't know what I mean. A man ought always to know what another man means before he makes his remarks. I mean, I like a book to go out of my sight, and the price of it to go into my pocket, right slick off. But here's Dolman come to fetch you, Spelt," said the bookseller, as the cobbler made his appearance at the half-open door of the parlor. "No, I ain't," said Dolman. "I only come to let the guv'nor know as I'm a going home." "Where's that?" asked Kitely. "Leastways, I mean going home with a pair o' boots," answered Dolman, evasively, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. "Ah!" said the bookseller. CHAPTER VI. THE MORNING OF CHRISTMAS DAY.