"I'm not at all pleased with you," said Molly severely.

"How _can_ you say such savage things! And me an orphan, too!
What's the trouble? What have I done?"

"You know perfectly well. Making fun of father like that."

"My dear girl, he loved it. Brainy badinage of that sort is exchanged
every day in the best society. You should hear dukes and earls! The
wit! the _esprit_! The flow of soul! Mine is nothing to it. What's this
in the iron pot? Is this what you feed them? Queer birds, hens--I
wouldn't touch the stuff for a fortune. It looks perfectly poisonous.
Flock around, you pullets. Come in your thousands. All bad nuts
returned, and a souvenir goes with every corpse. A little more of this
putrescent mixture for you, sir. Certainly, pick up your dead, pick up
your dead."

An unwilling dimple appeared on Molly's chin, like a sunbeam through
clouds.

"All the same," she said, "you ought to be ashamed of yourself,
Jimmy."

"I haven't time when I find myself stopping in the same house with a
girl I've been looking for for three years."

Molly looked away. There was silence for a moment.

"Used you ever to think of me?" she said quietly.