It's
all the same thing. I understand it. I can see it. The house isn't
respectable, as it should be; and your mamma, if she were to know
all, would have a right to be angry with me. I did mean to be
respectable, Mr Eames; I did indeed."
"Miss Spruce will think better of it."
"You don't know what I've had to go through. There's none of them
pays, not regular,--only she and you. She's been like the Bank of
England, has Miss Spruce."
"I'm afraid I've not been very regular, Mrs Roper."
"Oh, yes, you have. I don't think of a pound or two more or less at
the end of a quarter, if I'm sure to have it some day. The
butcher,--he understands one's lodgers just as well as I do,--if the
money's really coming, he'll wait; but he won't wait for such as
them Lupexes, whose money's nowhere. And there's Cradell; would you
believe it, that fellow owes me eight-and-twenty pounds!"
"Eight and twenty pounds!"
"Yes, Mr Eames, eight-and-twenty pounds! He's a fool. It's them
Lupexes as have had his money. I know it. He don't talk of paying,
and going away.
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