At ten o’clock that night Patsy entered his bedroom with a tin candlestick in his hand. He placed the candlestick on the dressing-table, and, approaching the bed, began to unload his pockets of plunder; nuts, and almonds, and raisins, a crystallised apricot and a piece of green angelica made up the pile which he placed on the coverlet of the bed, also a huge Tom Smith cracker with a picture of Miss Marie Studholme stuck on the gelatine cover. He surveyed the lot with a grin of satisfaction, sat down on the side of the bed, and was just setting to work when a scratching noise at the window drew his attention, and, looking up, he saw at the pane the white face of Con Cogan. Patsy’s jaw dropped, and the walnut which he was in the act of cracking dropped also, fell on the floor, and rolled into a corner. “Oh, musha!” said Patsy, “there he is again!” He got off the bed and, like a fascinated bird, approached the beckoning form at the window. “What is it you want?” asked Patsy, as he raised the sash. “Sure, the house is all a-bed, and it’s ruined I’ll be if they hear you.” “What’s all that on the bed?” asked Con; “all them things on the quilt you was eatin’?” “Sure, they’re only some nuts and raisins,” replied Patsy, who saw his prospective feast vanishing before him. “What is it you want? for it’s ruined I’ll be if they hear us.” “I’ll come in and help yiz,” said Con, putting one leg over the sill. “There’s no law in the land can put a man in prizin for comin’ in to have supper wid his nephew. It’s afraid I am,” said Con, putting the other leg over, “that it’s indisgestion you’ll be havin’. The idea,” went on he, sitting down on the edge of the bed and surveying the feast—“the idea of lettin’ childer stuff thimselves up wid sweets and nuts! It’s ashamed the ould lady ought to be of herself. Sit down on the bed beside me, Patsy Rooney, and there’s a walnut for you. I’ll attind to the sweets.” He put the crystallised apricot in his mouth, and Patsy, with the walnut in his hand, sat watching his treasures vanishing. “You’re not eatin’ your nuts,” said Mr Cogan, as he swallowed the last of the chocolates and set to on the nuts. “What is it you’re afther?” said Patsy, whose appetite had completely disappeared. “What’s made you come to-night at all, at all?” Mr Cogan cracked a walnut and devoured the contents. “And what’s this?” said he, taking up the cracker, without replying to Patsy’s very pertinent question. “Thims is crackers,” replied Patsy in a half-hearted voice. “Is it Paddy Murphy’s job you’re afther, or what?” “And who’s the girl, may I ax?” went on Mr Cogan, examining Miss Studholme with a critical and approving eye. “I dunno,” replied Patsy. “Sure, it’s moidhered I am! What is it you’re afther, Con Cogan?” “Is it to eat, or what?” asked Mr Cogan, still disregarding Patsy, and touching the gelatine cover with his tongue.