D. Wragg did not approve of waste, so taking the half-dead bird to one corner, he opened the cage, wherein, fixed and glaring with its yellow eye, sat a kestrel, which sluggishly dropped from its perch, and, with a good deal of unnecessary beating of its pointed wings, seized the hapless chirrupper in one quartette of yellow claws, returned to its seat, and then and there proceeded to strip the sparrow, sending a cloud of light downy feathers into the cage of its neighbour, a staring barn-owl, which had opened its eyes for a few minutes, but only to blink a while before subsiding into what appeared to be a ball of feathers. A pair of bullfinches were then roused, by a finger drawn rapidly across the cage bars--the effect being decidedly startling, while the next object upon which the dealer's eye fell was a disreputable-looking, ragged-coated, grey parrot, busily engaged in picking off its feathers, as if, out of spite for its imprisonment, it wished to render itself as unsightly and unsaleable as possible. "You're a beauty, you are!" growled D. Wragg, poking at it viciously with the perch; but, nothing daunted, the bird seized the end of the assailing weapon with its strong hooked beak, and held on fiercely, screaming a loud defiance the while. With a dexterous jerk, the stick was withdrawn--a strategical movement evidently taken by the bird as a token of defeat; for it stood upon one leg, derisively danced its head up and down, and then loudly cried out--"Quack--quack--quack!" an accomplishment learned of a couple of London-white Aylesbury ducks, located in a small green dog-kennel, whose door was formed of an old half-worn fire-guard. Apparently satisfied, D. Wragg withdrew to a corner which he specially affected, and turned his back to door and window while he drew forth his dirty pocket-book and carefully examined the two crisp bank-notes, replaced them, and buttoned them up in his breastpocket, as he muttered, softly-- "More yet, my lad, more yet! I shouldn't be a bit surprised if you turned out a mint to some on us afore we've done with you. And why not?" he muttered again, as he glanced uneasily over his shoulder. "What's the good o' money to such as him. If he likes to come on the chance of seeing her here, 'taint my doing, is it? I wish she was here always, I do." D. Wragg frowned as he proceeded to refresh himself with another pipe, and a renewed spelling over of his paper. Then he cocked his head on one side, magpie fashion, and listened, for a light step was heard, and the closing of a door, and the next minute, without waiting for her friend to descend, Patty was up-stairs, where Janet was watching her goldfish. The latter turned as soon as she saw Patty, and seeming to read trouble in her face, she wound her arm round the little waist and drew her close.