"I just now gave them fifty taels for her," pursued Madame Wang. "I also
meant to let them have some of your cousin's new clothes to enshroud her
in. But, who'd have thought it, none of the girls had, strange
coincidence, any newly-made articles of clothing; and there were only
that couple of birthday suits of your cousin Lin's. But as your cousin
Lin has ever been such a sensitive child and has always too suffered and
ailed, I thought it would be unpropitious for her, if her clothes were
also now handed to people to wrap their dead in, after she had been told
that they were given her for her birthday. So I ordered a tailor to get
a suit for her as soon as possible. Had it been any other servant-girl,
I could have given her a few taels and have finished. But Chin
Ch'uan-erh was, albeit a servant-maid, nearly as dear to me as if she
had been a daughter of mine."

Saying this, tears unwittingly ran down from her eyes.

"Aunt!" vehemently exclaimed Pao-ch'ai. "What earthly use is it of
hurrying a tailor just now to prepare clothes for her? I have a couple
of suits I made the other day and won't it save trouble were I to go and
bring them for her? Besides, when she was alive, she used to wear my old
clothes. And what's more our figures are much alike."

"What you say is all very well," rejoined Madame Wang; "but can it be
that it isn't distasteful to you?"

"Compose your mind," urged Pao-ch'ai with a smile. "I have never paid
any heed to such things."

As she spoke, she rose to her feet and walked away.