"It is well that no one is here to hear this lamentable display of ignorance," said Mrs. Calverley, with a snort. "It is a scriptural story, Mr. Calverley, and is intended as a footstool for the Church of St. Beowulph." "O yes," said John, nodding his head; "I know--Bewsher's place." "It would be more decent, as well as more correct, to speak of it as the church in which Mr. Bewsher is officiating minister, I think," said Mrs. Calverley with another snort. "To be sure, my dear; quite correct," said peace-loving John. "By the way, talking about officiating ministers, perhaps you had better not ask Martin to come to us just yet; I have got to go down to that place in the North next week." "What place in the North?" said Mrs. Calverley, looking up. "What place? Why, my dear, Swartmoor, of course--the foundry, you know; that's the only place I go to in the North." "I don't know what place you do or do not go to in the North, or anywhere else, Mr. Calverley," said his wife, sticking her needle into the canvas, and interlacing her bony fingers and sitting bolt upright, as she glared straight at him; "I only know this, that I am determined not to stand this state of things much longer." "But, my dear--" "Don't 'my dear' me, if you please, but listen to what I have to say. When I married you, Mr. Calverley, to my sorrow, now some ten years ago, you were nothing more than the head clerk in the house of Lorraine Brothers, which my grandfather had founded, which my father and uncles had established, and in which my late husband, Mr. Gurwood, had been a sleeping partner." "I must say that--" "Silence, if you please; I will not be interrupted. I took you from that inferior position, and made you my husband. I made you master of this house and my fortune. I raised you, Mr. Calverley. I tell you, I raised you, sir, from obscurity to position, from comparative penury to wealth; and what is my reward? Day after day you are absent from home at your counting-house in Mincing-lane. I don't object to that; I suppose it is necessary; but I know--yes, I know, Mr. Calverley--this is not my first experience of men of business; I have been a grand-daughter, a daughter, and a sister of the firm, and though latterly Mr. Gurwood was not quite regular in his attendance, at least at one time he was an excellent man of business--so that I may say also the wife of the firm, and I know that business hours are over at five, and that my sainted father used then to come straight home to Clapham by the omnibus." "I--"