'Lavinia!' said Mrs Wilfer. 'Hold! I will not allow you to utter in my
presence the absurd suspicion that any strangers--I care not what their
names--can patronize my child. Do you dare to suppose, you ridiculous
girl, that Mr and Mrs Boffin would enter these doors upon a patronizing
errand; or, if they did, would remain within them, only for one single
instant, while your mother had the strength yet remaining in her vital
frame to request them to depart? You little know your mother if you
presume to think so.'

'It's all very fine,' Lavinia began to grumble, when Mrs Wilfer
repeated:

'Hold! I will not allow this. Do you not know what is due to guests?
Do you not comprehend that in presuming to hint that this lady and
gentleman could have any idea of patronizing any member of your
family--I care not which--you accuse them of an impertinence little less
than insane?'

'Never mind me and Mrs Boffin, ma'am,' said Mr Boffin, smilingly: 'we
don't care.'

'Pardon me, but I do,' returned Mrs Wilfer.

Miss Lavinia laughed a short laugh as she muttered, 'Yes, to be sure.'

'And I require my audacious child,' proceeded Mrs Wilfer, with a
withering look at her youngest, on whom it had not the slightest effect,
'to please to be just to her sister Bella; to remember that her sister
Bella is much sought after; and that when her sister Bella accepts an