Thirty-five dollars and the water extra. I don't
think we can afford it, Mac."
"Ah, pshaw!" growled the dentist, "sure we can."
"It isn't only that," said Trina, "but it'll cost so much to make the
change."
"Ah, you talk's though we were paupers. Ain't we got five thousand
dollars?"
Trina flushed on the instant, even to the lobes of her tiny pale ears,
and put her lips together.
"Now, Mac, you know I don't want you should talk like that. That money's
never, never to be touched."
"And you've been savun up a good deal, besides," went on McTeague,
exasperated at Trina's persistent economies. "How much money have you
got in that little brass match-safe in the bottom of your trunk? Pretty
near a hundred dollars, I guess--ah, sure." He shut his eyes and nodded
his great head in a knowing way.
Trina had more than that in the brass match-safe in question, but her
instinct of hoarding had led her to keep it a secret from her husband.
Now she lied to him with prompt fluency.
"A hundred dollars! What are you talking of, Mac? I've not got fifty.
I've not got THIRTY."
"Oh, let's take that little house," broke in McTeague. "We got the
chance now, and it may never come again.
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