"
"You mistake me," said Hardie with a smile. "An entry in your banker's
book is a receipt. However, you can have one in another form." He then
unlocked a desk, took out a banker's receipt; and told Skinner to fill it
in. This done, he seemed to be absorbed in some more important matter.
Skinner counted the notes and left them with Mr. Hardie; the bills he
took to his desk to note them on the back of the receipt. Whilst he was
writing this with his usual slowness and precision, poor Dodd's heart
overflowed. "It is my children's fortune, ye see: I don't look on a
sixpence of it as mine: that it is what made me so particular. It belongs
to my little Julia, bless her:--she is a rosebud if ever there was one;
and oh! such a heart; and so fond of her poor father; but not fonder than
he is of her--and to my dear boy Edward; he is the honestest young chap
you ever saw: what he says, you may swear to with your eyes shut. But how
could they miss either good looks or good hearts, and _her_ children? the
best wife and the best mother in England. She has been a true consort to
me this many a year, and I to her, in deep water and shoal, let the wind
blow high or low.
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