In such moments of irritation, Milly's husband was apt to declare that his mother-in-law had abundance of clothes-brushes, for, he pertinently asked, how did she manage during her frequent business tours in the country?
He gave it as his conviction that Malka merely took the clothes-brush away to afford herself a handle for returning.

But then Ephraim Phillips was a graceless young fellow, the death of whose first wife was probably a judgment on his levity, and everybody except his second mother-in-law knew that he had a book of tickets for the Oxbridge Music Hall, and went there on Friday nights.

Still, in spite of these facts, experience did show that whenever Milly's camp had outsulked Malka's, the old woman's surrender was always veiled under the formula of: "Oh Milly, I've brought you over your clothes-brush.

I just noticed it, and thought you might be wanting it." After this, conversation was comparatively easy.
Moses hardly cared to face Malka in such a crisis of the clothes-brush.
He turned away despairingly, and was going back through the small archway which led to the Ruins and the outside world, when a grating voice startled his ear.
"Well, Meshe, whither fliest thou?
Has my Milly forbidden thee to see me ?" He looked back.

Malka was standing at her house-door.