to that
event, in general terms, she loved to refer the ruin of her family), and
some youthful extravagances, his income, joined to hers, could not keep
the dear child in that fashion and appearance her mother had enjoyed
before her, and people without pedigree or solid pretension of any sort,
looked down upon her, just because they had money (she meant the
Chattesworths), and denied her the position which was hers of right, and
so seeing no other way of doing the poor child justice, she applied to
'M. M.'

'To find a husband for Mag, eh?' said Toole.

'No, no. Oh, Dr. Toole, 'twas--'twas for _me_,' sobbed poor Mrs. Mack.
Toole stared for a moment, and had to turn quickly about, and admire
some shell-work in a glass box over the chimneypiece very closely, and I
think his stout short back was shaking tremulously as he did so; and,
when he turned round again, though his face was extraordinarily grave,
it was a good deal redder than usual.

'Well, my dear Madam, and where's the great harm in that, when all's
done?' said Toole.

'Oh, doctor, I had the unpardonable _wake_ness, whatever come over me,
to write her two letters on the subject, and she'll print them, and
expose me, unless,'--here she rolled herself about in an agony of tears,
and buried her fat face in the back of the chair.

'Unless you give her money, I suppose,' said Toole. 'There's what
invariably comes of confidential communications with female enchanters
and gipsies! And what do you propose to do?'

'I don't know--what can I do? She got the L5 I borrowed from my brother,
and he can't lend me more; and I can't tell him what I done with that;
and she has L3 10s. I--I raised on my best fan, and the elegant
soiclainet, you know--I bought it of Knox & Acheson, at the Indian
Queen, in Dame-street;' and his poor patient turned up her small tearful
blue eyes imploringly to his face, and her good-natured old features
were quivering all over with tribulation.

'And Mag knows nothing of all this?' said Toole.

'Oh, not for the wide world,' whispered the matron, in great alarm.
'Whisht! is that her coming?'

'No; there she is across the street talking to Mrs. Nutter. Listen to
me: I'll manage that lady, Mrs. Mary--what's her name?--Matchwell. I'll
take her in hands, and--whisper now.'

So Toole entered into details, and completed an officious little
conspiracy; and the upshot of it was that Mrs. Mack, whenever M. M. fixed
a day for her next extortionate v