must have paid, or handsomely compounded for, Ralph's debt, and being by no means confident that he would have succeeded had he undertaken his enterprise alone, he regained his equanimity, and chattered and mowed over more satisfactory items until the entrance of Peg Sliderskew interrupted him.
"Aha, Peg!" said Arthur, "what is it? What is it now, Peg?"
"It's the fowl," replied Peg, holding up a plate containing a little—a very little one—quite a phenomenon of a fowl—so very small and skinny.
"A beautiful bird!" said Arthur, after inquiring the price, and finding it proportionate to the size. "With a rasher of ham, and an egg made into sauce, and potatoes, and greens, and an apple-pudding, Peg, and a little bit of cheese, we shall have a dinner for an emperor. There'll only be she and me—and you, Peg, when we've done—nobody else,"
"Don't you complain of the expense afterwards," said Mrs. Sliderskew, sulkily.
"I'm afraid we must live expensively for the first week," returned Arthur, with a groan, "and then we must make up for it. I won't eat more than I can help, and I know you love your old master too much to eat more than you can help, don't you, Peg?"
"Don't I what?" said Peg.
"Love your old master too much—"
"No, not a bit too much," said Peg.
"Oh dear, I wish the devil had this woman!" cried Arthur—"love him too much to eat more than you can help at his expense."
"At his what?" said Peg.
"Oh dear! she can never hear the most important word, and hears all the others!" whined Gride. "At his expense—you catamaran."
The last-mentioned tribute to the charms of Mrs. Sliderskew being uttered in a whisper, that lady assented to the general proposition by a harsh growl, which was accompanied by a ring at the street-door.
"There's the bell," said Arthur.
"Ay, ay; I know that," rejoined Peg.
"Then why don't you go?" bawled Arthur.
"Go where ?" retorted Peg. "I ain't doing any harm here, am I?"
Arthur Gride in reply repeated the word "bell" as loud as he could roar, and his meaning being rendered further intelligible to Mrs. Sliderskew's dull sense of hearing by pantomime expressive of ringing at a street-door. Peg hobbled out, after sharply demanding why he hadn't said there was a ring before, instead of talking about all manner of things that had nothing to do with it, and keeping her half-pint of beer waiting on the steps.
"There's a change come over you, Mrs. Peg," said Arthur, following her out with his eyes. "What it means I don't quite know, but if it lasts we shan't agree together long, I see. You are turning crazy, I think, and if you are you must take yourself off, Mrs. Peg—or be taken off. All's one to me." Turning over the leaves of his book as he muttered this, he soon lighted upon something which attracted his
