"You are very clever, no doubt, Dick, at keeping secrets and hiding things away from your wife--" "That's right," said Dick. "Go it! I wish I was poor again." "But you know no more about that poor girl's feelings than you do of Chinese." "Well, I don't know much about Chinese, mother, certainly, but I'm sure it ain't Tom. How can it be?" "I don't know how it can be," said Mrs Shingle tartly, "or how it can't be; but fretting after Tom Shingle she is, and it's my belief he's very fond of her." "There you go," said Dick, who was warming himself, with his back to the fire, waiting for the object of their solicitude to come down to dinner--for she had been lying down the greater part of the day--"there you go, mother, a-showing yourself up and contradicting common-sense. I say it's after Fred she's fretting." "I know you do," said Mrs Shingle, tightening her lips and giving her head a shake, which plainly said--"I'll die before I'll give in." "Let me have one word in, mother, if it's only edgewise," cried Dick. "There, go on--I know what you are about to say." "No, you don't, mother; so don't aggravate. I say it's Fred." "I know you do." "For this reason. He's forbid the house, and I won't have it; for I hear nothing but what's bad spoken of him. I won't have him here. He ain't worthy of her. So he can't come, and she, poor girl, frets about it; and if she don't get better I shall have to give in. Now, you say it's Tom." "Yes," said Mrs Shingle, nodding her head. "Well, then, why don't he come? or why don't she send for him and make it right? Can't you see that if it were as you say, all would be right directly?" Mrs Shingle shook her head. "That's right; be obstinate, mother, when you know there's nothing to prevent his coming." Jessie came in directly, looking very pale and sweet in her sadness: her eyes were sunken with wakefulness, but she had a smile for both, and an affectionate kiss before taking her place at the table; where, after kicking himself in his misery, Dick set-to, pretending not to notice his child's depression, though he felt a bitter pang at his heart as he was guilty of every bit of clowning in his efforts to bring a smile from the suffering girl's eyes. At times, though, he was very absent, and his tongue went on talking at random--of the last thing, perhaps, that he had seen--while his mind was far away. In fact, had his brother been present, with witnesses, he would have had strong grounds for saying that Dick's brain was softening at the very least. He began with grace, standing up, and very reverently said the customary formula, ending "truly thankful. Amen. Pure pickles, sauces, and jams," he continued, for his eye had lighted upon the label of a bottle in the silver stand.