"I am an excellent bookkeeper." "Oh, I shouldn't like to trouble you," said Mrs.Wayne, but she made it clear she would like it above everything; so Lanley put on his spectacles, drew up his chair, and squared his elbows to the job.
"It hasn't been balanced since--dear me! not since October," he said.
"I know; but I draw such small checks." "But you draw a good many." She had risen, and was standing before the fire, with her hands behind her back.

Her shawl had slipped off, and she looked, in her short walking-skirt, rather like a school-girl being reprimanded for a poor exercise.

She felt so when, looking up at her over his spectacles, he observed severely: "You really must be more careful about carrying forward.

Twice you have carried forward an amount from two pages back instead of--" "That's always the way," she interrupted.

"Whenever people look at my check-book they take so long scolding me about the way I do it that there's no time left for putting it right." "I won't say another word," returned Lanley; "only it would really help you--" "I don't want any one to do it who says my sevens are like fours," she went on.