"Matter!" he yelled; he really yelled. "This tie, it will not
tie." He became dangerously sarcastic. "Not round my neck!
Round the bed-post! Oh yes, twenty times have I made it up round
the bed-post, but round my neck, no! Oh dear no! begs to be
excused!"

He thought Mrs. Darling was not sufficiently impressed, and he
went on sternly, "I warn you of this, mother, that unless this
tie is round my neck we don't go out to dinner to-night, and if I
don't go out to dinner to-night, I never go to the office again,
and if I don't go to the office again, you and I starve, and our
children will be flung into the streets."