40 THE KING OF SCHNORRERS.
tion with a beautiful brunette who was tasting the cool of the evening in a sedan chair, and it was with a touch of asperity that she said : " Cook complains of being insulted by a saucy fellow who brought home your fish."
" Oh ! " said poor Grobstock. Was he never to be done with the man?
" How came you to send him to her? "
His anger against Manasseh resurged under his wife's peevishness.
"My dear," he cried, "I did not send him anywhere — except to the devil."
" Joseph ! You might keep such language for the ears of creatures in sedan chairs."
And Mrs. Grobstock flounced out of the room with a rustle of angry satin.
When Wilkinson reappeared, limp and tired, with his pompousness exuded in perspiration, he sought his master with a message, which he delivered ere the flood of interro- gation could burst from Grobstock's lips.
" Mr. da Costa presents his compliments, and says that he has decided on reconsideration not to break his promise to be with you on Friday evening."
" Oh, indeed ! " said Grobstock grimly. " And, pray, how came you to carry his box ? "
" You told me to, sir ! "
"/ told you ! "
" I mean he told me you told me to," said Wilkinson wonderingly. " Didn't you ? "
Grobstock hesitated. Since Manasseh would be his guest, was it not imprudent to give him away to the livery- servant? Besides, he felt a secret pleasure in Wilkinson's humiliation — but for the Schnorrer he would never have known that Wilkinson's gold lace concealed a pliable per-
