"I can't help it, Jo-si-ah. That man, whenever I meet him, makes me begin to boil. So smooth, and polite, and smiling, and squeeze-your-handy, while all the while he's laughing at you for being so fat." "Laughing at me for being so fat?" "No, no. You know what I mean--laughing at me myself for being so fat. I 'ate him." "Well, I don't want you to love him, old lady." "I should think not, indeed, with his nasty dark eyes and his long black mustarchers. Ugh! the monster. I 'ate him." "Handsomest man in Saltinville, my dear." "Handsome is as handsome does, Jo-si-ah. He's a black-hearted one, if ever there was one, I know." "Now, you don't know anything of the kind, old girl." "Oh, yes, I do, Jo-si-ah. I always feel it whenever he comes anigh one, and if I had a child of my own, and that man had come and wanted to marry her, I'd have cut her up in little pieces and scattered them all about the garden first." "Well, then, I suppose I ought to be very, very glad that we never had any little ones, for, though I should be very glad to get rid of you--" "No, you wouldn't, Jo-si-ah," said Mrs Barclay, showing her white teeth. "Yes, I should, but I shouldn't have liked to see you hung for murder." "Don't talk like that, Jo-si-ah. It gives me the shivers. That word makes me think about old Lady Teigne, and not being safe in my bed." "Stuff and nonsense!" "It isn't stuff and nonsense, Jo-si-ah. I declare, ever since that dreadful affair, I never see a bolster without turning cold all down my back; and I feel as if it wasn't safe to put my head upon my pillow of a night. There: he's ringing because you're so long." "Then I shall be longer," growled Barclay, putting a wafer in his mouth. "How that poor Claire Denville can stop in that house of a night I don't know." "Ah, that puts me in mind of something: I wish you wouldn't be so fond of that Claire Denville." "Why not? I must be fond of somebody." "Be fond of me, then, I'm ugly enough." "So I am fond of you, Jo-si-ah, and you are not ugly, and I should like to hear anyone say you were to my face." "I don't like that Denville lot." "No more do I, Jo-si-ah, only poor dear Claire. Her father ain't bad, but she's as good as gold." "I don't know so much about that," muttered Barclay. "And now, Jo-si-ah, just you be careful with that Major Rockley. He owes you a lot now." "Yes, but I've got him tight enough." "And if you let him have more you get him tighter. He's a bold, bad man, always gambling and drinking, and doing worse." "Oh, I'm very fond of him, old lady," said Barclay, chuckling. "I love him like a son, and--there he is again. I must go now." It was only into the next room, but there were double doors, and as Barclay entered the Major's countenance did not look at all handsome, but very black and forbidding.