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 "Don't you worry where your peacock got 'is tail; you just feel proud," replied Bindle, seating himself on the only chair the bedroom boasted. "Your ole man is goin' to be the belle of the ball to-night."

"You been buyin' them things, an' me doin' my own housework an' keepin' you when you're out of work!" Mrs. Bindle's voice rose as the full sense of the injustice of it all began to dawn upon her. "You spendin' money on dress-suits and beer, an' me inchin' an' pinchin' to keep you in food. It's a shame. I won't stand it, I won't." Mrs. Bindle looked about her helplessly. "I'll leave you, I will, you—you"

"Oh no, yer won't," remarked Bindle complacently; "women like you don't leave men like me. That's wot matrimony's for, to keep two people together wot ought to be kept apart by Act o' Parliament."

"Where'd you get that dress-suit?" broke in Mrs. Bindle tenaciously.

"As I was say in'," continued Bindle imperturbably, "matrimony's a funny thing."

"Where'd you get that dress-suit?" Mrs. Bindle broke in again.

Bindle sighed, and cast up his eyes in mock appeal. "I 'ad it give to me so that I might be worthy o' wot the Lord 'as sent me an' won't 'ave back at no price—that is to say, yerself, Mrs. B. If marriages is really made in 'eaven, then there ought to be a 'Returned with thanks'