suppose, Peter, that I would do that—oh!
no! take Polly's place?"

"What place, girl—the one she didn't
get? She started fair with you, had every
chance—had more than her chance.  Well,
now, the game is yours, my pet, instead."

She shrank back, nearer and nearer the
door, shielding her face with her hand.
"You don't mean this, Peter—you can't.
What, that we were set at this man!"

"Ah, no—not at all!  I thought with
you that he was head and heels in love
with Polly. We thought wrong. It was
you, Katey, instead. What's the harm?"

"Oh, never, never!"

"Oh, but ever, ever! See here now——"
and his jovial face changed into a fierce,
savage, and threatening one. "See here
plainly. Tricks of this sort won't do, my
girl. You must go through with this. I
won't be laughed at, and scoffed at, and
degraded as the failure Doctor. I don't want
to be hooted out of the place, as the schemer
that tried to take in the fellow, and broke
down, or was put down by that Morrison."

"Then let us leave the place, Peter.
In Heaven's name, yes. Better——"

"All folly and bosh! Leave it, and leave
it beggared! I tell you I have put money
on this, every halfpenny I could scrape or
borrow. I won't be ruined or disgraced
for any girl's folly. And I won't have you
pointed at as a poor pair of scheming hacks
that didn't know how to go about your
trade. I won't, I tell you, I won't!  Or, if
ye choose to go against me in this"—here
his face contorted, and his arm came down
as if giving a blow—" by the holy woolsack,
I'll run away in the night to America,
and leave you all only the dust of my shoes
to live on."

Katey was utterly scared by this
harangue.  Her father had always been her
brain, her soul; there was great reason
in these topics, and the allusion to the
disgrace to the family came home to the Irish
heart.  And then, if Peter ran away!  She
could only plead, falteringly:  "But poor
Tom Clarke, Peter——"

"Ah, nonsense!  I've no patience with
you," the Doctor said, striking home.
"Then you don't know what's before us.
There'll be that low, proud woman coming
down on us with her impertinence, and
giving us her orders: she won't suffer it—
we are all low canal; and she wouldn't
touch you, my beauties, with her parasol.
Above all, there's your 'low father,' the man
she insulted—she'd give her two eyes to
level me in the mud for my presumption."

This again appealed to Katey's national
character.

"As for that matter, Peter," she said,
her lip curling with scorn, " we're as good
as any Leader of them."

"My dear, good, sensible Katey," the
Doctor said, changing his tone, "now I rely
on you to stand by me. You don't know
where we are; there is lava under our feet,
which may give way at any moment, and
drop us into the crater of bankruptcy.
You'll stand by me and darling Polly,
whose fault this failure is not, and whom
you can take to London under your own
pretty wing and bespeak her a husband any
time. I always said you'd save the family
and her. Poor Polly—such a disappointment!"

Utterly bewildered and overwhelmed,
Katey could only say: "But this is not
right: marriage is not to be turned into
such a thing. And, oh! poor Tom!"

"Don't mention that name; he insulted
you and your father. Whist, come up with
me. It's the finest thing for Polly in the
world!" He hurried her up-stairs, and
burst in upon Polly still brooding over her
mortification, indignant at the wrongs that
came from her sister. But the Doctor
swept all away impetuously.

"Come, Polly dear, we've settled it
all. It's not a bit Katey's fault. I acquit
her, hoto-toto. Sure you're in the same
boat."

"I'll never speak to her, the artful,
mean——"

"Stop all that; you're going too far.
You broke down, my pet, and should not
grudge another. Now don't bother me,
you foolish child. Isn't it all one? Won't
you go up to town, and ride in a carriage,
and get Lord Maybe next? For Heaven's
sake be quiet, while I go in, and drive the
big nail home."

CHAPTER XXX. "THE BIG NAIL DRIVEN HOME."

THIS wonderful Doctor had a special
manner of his own with his family, which
was irresistible. Indeed, they all looked
on him as a sort of deputy providence,
whose decrees it was idle to think of
opposing. Both girls were bewildered, and
waited his return. He went round into
the young man's room, closed the door,
with an affected care to see that it fitted
close, and then said in a stern voice:

"See here, Mr. Cecil, it is time that we
have an explanation: you've behaved
ungenerously, sir, and unhandsomely to
me."