continued in a shriek. "When are ye to get
me money? Who is to pay me for my keep
of you? When are you to stop this plundering
of me? Answer me!"

She pulled away the statutes at large, and
the clause in question from under his finger.

"Soon," he said, quite undisturbed; "soon,
I am confident. It will all come in a short
time."

"How long have you been telling me that
story?" she answered. "Beggar that you
now and always will be, full of impostor's
promises, when are you to have money, I
say again?"

"Soon, I am confident, as I told you
before."

"Ah-r-r! the same old whining story!
Why didn't you take Jordan's place? Not a
bit sorry for it now: not a bit sorry; not a
bit!"

"No," said Mr. Lyttleton quite calmly.
"It was the wisest step I ever took in my
life."

"O hear him, the beggar! Why don't I
turn these paupers into the street?" She
would not have done it for a hundred pounds.
But there was that second grater ready now,
and waiting to be used. "No," she said,
fetching it up; "but I must get my house
fuller of them—have more on my hands.
Two girls here next week, pauper cousins of
your own; that beggar uncle must needs die
and leave them without a penny."

A little tinge came for an instant into the
barrister's cheek. There had been days
once in his life when cousins had come
together in that country life, gathering
flowers and inhaling that freshly-mown hay
together. Cousins, pauper or otherwise,
wandering over the green meadows, long,
long before that grinding had begun.

"Are you going to have them to live with
you?" he said, after a pause. "Conalore
and Prue?"

"Ay!" Martha Daxe answered; "and a
pretty workhouse full we shall have of it
then. But I shall take it out of them. O
my! if I won't take it out of them!"

She strode up and down the room, saying
that over and over again, Mr. Lyttleton
regarding her patiently.

"Look at my money!" she said, stopping
suddenly before a row of some half-dozen
law books; "see how I am swindled! When
will you pay me, I say, for your keep and
lodging? When will you give me me
money?"

"You will have it one day; I am confident
of it as I sit here a living man; so give me
peace till then."

"The old sing-song," she said, putting by
the grater, "the old trumpery tune."

And with that she turned away, and strode
up the well-staircase again. Much invigorated
was she by that short interview. It
was as good as an elixir to her, and that
prospect of two more shortly to arrive, who
would take their share of bitter tonguing, was
specially comforting. Why, taking it in this
view, that were only a wretched, beggarly
curate's daughters (so she put it as she went
up the stairs), who, at best, were fit only for
tramping the streets (so also she put it), they
might think themselves too well off, the low
jades!

"Hi, Ben! Ben Alibone!" she called out
down the well-staircase, leaning on her elbows.
She had to call twice for that matter, and
then a thick-set, burly man, with a squint,
and in his shirt sleeves, came out of a cabin
door, and stood looking up from the
bottom.

"Well!" he said.

"Did you hear me call to you?" she asked.

"I couldn't come sooner," he answered,
bluntly. "What do you want now? You
always think you can take your time with
me; but I won't stand it! What do you want
now, I say again?" he answered, leaning
himself against the last balustrade; "unless you
are minded to begin a-bullying of me."

"Ah-r-r you!" she said, shaking her hand
at him.

"Ah-r-r yourself!" he retorted, turning
on his heel in through the dark cabin door.

He knew she had no real business with
him beyond that mere pastime of bullying,
and so went in without a word more. She
had her interest out of Ben Alibone's wages,
too. He stood up to her, as he himself put
it, and gave as good as he got. Such a
horrid squint as the man had!

II.

BUT the two low jades, Curate Rhode's
daughters—who were to arrive presently in
the mean cab, with an old hair trunk on
top—it did seem a hard thing that they
should be brought in to leech on old Martha
Daxe. Hard, certainly, that she should have
that bequest of two fair pieces of flesh, born
of sixty pounds a year, and with no inheritance
beyond the old hair trunk! When, three
days after, the mean cab came up and set
down the two paupers, there was a certain
commotion among neighbours. "Bolt the
door behind you, Ben Alibone," was their
first greeting: and they passed in, to the
music of the rattling of chains. Martha Daxe,
half-way up the well-staircase, gave them
ogre's welcome; interest was to accrue from
that moment.

One was what (had she an eye to such
things) she would have called a presentable
wench. That was Conalore. A tall creature,
gracefully shaped, and made to be loved;
whose hair ran round her head in ripples
and was gathered at the back, like a Greek
statue's. A girl formed for the bright, open
country, for the fields and mountains; but
not for the gaol (Alibone, gaoler) into which
she was entering. In truth, she was not one
to play Picciola or Prison Flower, unless
with foreknowledge of there being some