"But, mama! For the sake of the profit on a pound of sugar!"

"There's no profit on it at all, Bessie. If she had taken a quarter of a
pound of tea with it there would have been three-ha'pence into our
pockets. But she did not. So you see I perjured myself for nothing."

"Don't let the thought trouble you for an instant, ma'am," Mr. Gibbon
advised. "None of us can afford to be too nice in trade. We've got to
live, Miss Bessie. Customers don't think so--they'd skin us if they
could--but we have. I'm of Mr. Boult's mind on that subject, although
there isn't much I uphold him in. 'Let us do our best for the public while
it pays reasonable prices,' he says, 'and when it won't, let us _do_ the
public.'"

"All that is so low, Mr. Gibbon."

"But it's business, Miss Bessie. Business is low."

"Oh, don't let us talk about it now," Deleah pleads.

"Deleah has a secret. She's dying to tell us all," Deleah's mother said.

"It's something Deleah's been up to!"

"No, Bess. Calm yourself. Calm all yourselves."

"But how can we? Out with it, darling."

"It's nothing, mama."