He glanced round, having forgotten it. He took the envelope, doubled it and pushed it in his waistcoat pocket. “It’s from William Housley,” he replied. “Oh! And what has he to say?” she asked. George turned his dark eyes at her. “Nothing!” he said. “Hm-Hm!” sneered Meg. “Funny letter, about nothing!” “I suppose,” said the child, with her insolent, high-pitched superiority, “It’s some money that he doesn’t want us to know about.” “That’s about it!” said Meg, giving a small laugh at the child’s perspicuity. “So’s he can keep it for himself, that’s what it is,” continued the child, nodding her head in rebuke at him. “I’ve no right to any money, have I?” asked the father sarcastically. “No, you haven’t,” the child nodded her head at him dictatorially, “you haven’t, because you only put it in the fire.” “You’ve got it wrong,” he sneered. “You mean it’s like giving a child fire to play with.” “Um!—and it is, isn’t it Mam?”—the small woman turned to her mother for corroboration. Meg had flushed at his sneer, when he quoted for the child its mother’s dictum. “And you’re very naughty!” preached Gertie, turning her back disdainfully on her father. “Is that what the parson’s been telling you?” he asked, a grain of amusement still in his bitterness. “No it isn’t!” retorted the youngster. “If you want to know you should go and listen for yourself. Everybody that goes to church looks nice——” she glanced at her mother and at herself, pruning herself proudly, “—and God loves them,” she added. She assumed a sanctified expression, and continued after a little thought: “Because they look nice and are meek.” “What!” exclaimed Meg, laughing, glancing with secret pride at me. “Because they’re meek!” repeated Gertie, with a superior little smile of knowledge. “You’re off the mark this time,” said George. “No, I’m not, am I Mam? Isn’t it right Mam? ‘The meek shall inevit the erf’?” Meg was too much amused to answer. “The meek shall have herrings on earth,” mocked the father, also amused. His daughter looked dubiously at him. She smelled impropriety. “It’s not, Mam, is it?” she asked, turning to her mother. Meg laughed. “The meek shall have herrings on earth,” repeated George with soft banter. “No it’s not Mam, is it?” cried the child in real distress. “Tell your father he’s always teaching you something wrong,” answered Meg. Then I said I must go. They pressed me to stay. “Oh, yes—do stop to dinner,” suddenly pleaded the child, smoothing her wild ravels of curls after having drawn off her hat. She asked me again and again, with much earnestness. “But why?” I asked. “So’s you can talk to us this afternoon—an’ so’s Dad won’t be so dis’greeable,” she replied plaintively, poking the black spots on her muff. Meg moved nearer to her daughter with a little gesture of compassion. “But,” said I, “I promised a lady I would be back for lunch, so I must. You have some more visitors, you know.”