Beautiful but Poor — page 59: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

50 BEAUTIFUL BUT POOR. CHAPTER XI. DETECTED. Miss Scrimp was unusually cross that night at the supper table. There was less than the usual quan- tity of thin-sliced bread and butter on the table. The butter, ever scanty, was less by two plates, and the crackers altogether missing. When the boarders an- swered the cracked bell, and Hattie Butler took her usual seat close on her right, Miss Scrimp quite for- got to say, as she generally did, ‘‘good-evening, dear.”’ Miss Scrimp was all out of sorts, and she evidently didn’t care who knew it—or, perhaps, meant they all should know it. One of the girls, Wild Kate, the rest called her, she was ever so odd, willful, and daring, happened to ask why the table was likea worn-out whip-lash, and as no one could respond to the conundrum, she gave the solution herself. She said there was no cracker on it. ‘‘There’s no need of crackers when such snappish things are around as you are!’ shrieked Miss Scrimp. ‘This butter was made from milk that came from a very old cow. I’ve found three gray hairs ina very small piece, just enough to match the wafer- like thickness of this stale bread,’’ said Kate, never at a loss for a venomous reply when attacked oz Miss Scrimp. “Them that doesn’t like what I set before ’em can go farther and maybe tare worse,’’ snarled Miss Scrimp. Pere comicbooks. (e(e)