"I have, at my room, a bedstead I purchased from you some time ago,"
she replied. "Will you lend a small sum of money on it?"

"No" he answered. "I am not a pawnbroker."

"But you might accommodate a destitute mother," remarked Mrs.
Wentworth. "You have refused to give me credit, and now I ask you to
loan me a small sum of money, for the payment of which I offer
security."

"I cannot do it," he answered. "Ven I says a ting I means it."

"Will you buy the bedstead then?" asked Mrs. Wentworth in despair.

"Vat can I do mit it?" he enquired.

"Why you can sell again," replied Mrs. Wentworth. "It will always find
a purchaser, particularly now that the price of everything has
increased so largely."

"Veil, I vill puy te pedstead," he said, and then enquired: "How much
monish do you vant for it?"

"What will you give me?" she asked.

"I vill give you forty tollars for it," he replied.

"It must be worth more than that," she remarked. "The price of
everything is so increased that it appears to me as if the bedstead
should command a higher price than that offered by you."