Mrs. Faber quickly dried her tears and smiled.
"I can't help thinking of all my happiness now and comparing it with the past, and it's all owing to you, Toney. Do you remember----"
"Of course I do. What mostest fun we had when I dressed in your grandmother's garments, and then when your dear Henry came!"
"When I compare my past and my present I feel how ungrateful I am!"
"Nonsense, Chum, you _never_ were ungrateful! But look here, I got aunt's leave to furbish up this room a bit so that you shouldn't be reminded of the old order. I knew you would prefer our being together up here, and I've got lots to tell you. First, I've had some dresses made for you, so that you shouldn't be put to any expense for _my_ party." Toney quickly opened a wooden box and displayed the most lovely dresses imaginable, lovely because suitable and perfectly simple. One was a dinner dress of pale mauve silk, just suited to Mrs. Faber's delicate complexion, and the other was a white liberty silk dress for the ball. Mrs. Faber gasped.
"Oh no, Toney! it's impossible! They must have cost ever so much money, and I don't want people to say that I--I sponge upon you."
"There you are again, Crumpet! 'People to say,' I did think that you'd rise above that. Remember Henry's pleasure--and mine!"
"Look here, Chum, let's be serious just for one minute and listen. You know I've an awful lot of money, fifty thousand a year!" Mrs. Faber gasped again.
"It's a secret, by the way, but not from you. Well, when I first heard it I did what Pups would have done, I just dedicated it all to other people that wanted it, and I didn't guess it would be such hard work as I see it will be. After to-morrow I shall work like a Kanaka, but just for this week I'm going to please myself and not think if it's wise, or if it's political economy, or all the things I've been trying to learn to fit myself for spending this stuff."
"It will be too much work for you, dear!"
"Yes, it's awful! but I'm going to keep just enough to dress like Pups' daughter, because that's what I am. You know Aunt Dove never thought me fit to live here, and I'm not yet changed, you see! And there shall always be enough to take people abroad who want it every year, you, too, of course among the number, for you'll get so parochial if you don't rub about a little, that you must travel, and then the rest will have to be 'wisely distributed,' as Mr. Hales says. Ouf!"