"All men must die," said he at last, with
a strange sort of gravity, which first
suggested to Margaret the idea that he had been
drinking—not enough to intoxicate himself,
but enough to make his thoughts bewildered.
"But she were younger than me." Still he
pondered over the event, not looking at
Margaret, though he grasped her tight.
Suddenly, he looked up at her with a wild,
searching inquiry in his glance. "Yo're
sure and certain she's dead—not in a dwam,
a faint?—she's been so before, often."

"She is dead," replied Margaret. She felt
no fear in speaking to him, though he hurt
her arm with his gripe, and wild gleams came
across the stupidity of his eyes.

"She is dead!" she said.

He looked at her still with that searching
look, which seemed to fade out of his eyes as
he gazed. Then he suddenly let go his hold
of Margaret, and, throwing his body half
across the table, he shook it and every other
piece of furniture in the room, with his
violent sobs. Mary came trembling towards
him.

"Get thee gone!—get thee gone!" he
cried, striking wildly and blindly at her.
"What do I care for thee?" Margaret took
her hand, and held it softly in hers. He
tore his hair, he beat his head against the
hard wood, then he lay exhausted and stupid.
Still his daughter and Margaret did not
move. Mary trembled from head to foot.

At last—it might have been a quarter of
an hour, it might have been an hour—he
lifted himself up. His eyes were swollen and
bloodshot, and he seemed to have forgotten
that any one was by; he scowled at the
watchers when he saw them. He shook
himself heavily, gave them one more sullen
look, spoke never a word, but made for the
door.

"Oh, father, father!" said Mary, throwing
herself upon his arm,—"not to-night!
Any night but to-night. Oh, help me! he's
going out to drink again! Father, I'll not
leave yo. Yo may strike, but I'll not leave
yo. She told me last of all to keep yo fro'
drink!"

But Margaret stood in the doorway, silent
yet commanding. He looked up at her
defyingly.

"It's my own house. Stand out o' the
way, wench, or I'll make yo!" He had
shaken off Mary with violence: he looked
ready to strike Margaret. But she never
moved a feature—never took her deep,
serious eyes off him. He stared back on her
with gloomy fierceness. If she had stirred
hand or foot, he would have thrust her aside
with even more violence than he had used to
his own daughter, whose face was bleeding
from her fall against a chair.

"What are yo looking at me in that way
for?" asked he at last, daunted and awed by
her severe calm. "If yo think for to keep
me from going what gait I choose, because
she loved yo—and in my own house, too,
where I never asked yo to come, yo'r mistaken.
It's very hard upon a man that he can't go to
the only comfort left."

Margaret felt that he acknowledged her
power. What could she do next? He had
seated himself on a chair, close to the door;
half-conquered, half-resenting; intending to
go out as soon as she left her position, but
unwilling to use the violence he had
threatened not five minutes before.
Margaret laid her hand on his arm.

"Come with me," she said. "Come and
see her."

The voice in which she spoke was very low
and solemn; but there was no fear or doubt
expressed in it, either of him or of his
compliance. He sullenly rose up. He stood
uncertain, with dogged irresolution upon his
face. She waited him there; quietly and
patiently waited for his time to move. He
had a strange pleasure in making her wait;
but at last he moved towards the stairs.

She and he stood by the corpse.

"Her last words to Mary were, 'Keep my
father fro' drink.'"

"It canna hurt her now," muttered he.
"Nought can hurt her now." Then, raising
his voice to a wailing cry, he went on: "We
may quarrel and fall out—we may make
peace and be friends—we may clem to skin
and bone—and nought o' all our griefs will
ever touch her more. Hoo's had her portion
on 'em. What wi' hard work first, and sickness
at last, hoo's led the life of a dog. And
to die without knowing one good piece o'
rejoicing in all her days!  Nay, wench,
whatever hoo said, hoo can know nought
about it now, and I mun ha' a sup o' drink
just to steady me against sorrow."

"No," said Margaret, softening with his
softened manner. "You shall not. If her
life has been what you say, at any rate she
did not fear death as some do. Oh, you
should have heard her speak of the life to
come—the life hidden with God, that she is
now gone to."

He shook his head, glancing sideways up
at Margaret as he did so. His pale, haggard
face struck her painfully.

"You are sorely tired. Where have you
been all day—not at work?"

"Not at work, sure enough," said he, with
a short, grim laugh. "Not at what you call
work. I were at the Committee till I were
sickened out wi' trying to make fools hear
reason. I were fetched to Boucher's wife
afore seven this morning. She's bed-fast,
but she were raving and raging to know
where her dunder-headed brute of a chap
was, as if I'd to keep him—as if he were fit
to be ruled by me. The d——d fool, who has
put his foot in all our plans! And I've
walked my feet sore wi' going about for to
see men who would not be seen, now the law
is raised again us. And I were sore-hearted,
too, which is worse than sore-footed; and if I