a pace or two to form the
better judgment of his work; "as near the real thing as sixpenn'orth of
halfpence is to sixpence. What a pity that the whole front of the house
opens at once! If there was only a staircase in it now, and regular
doors to the rooms to go in at! But that's the worst of my calling, I'm
always deluding myself, and swindling myself."

"You are speaking quite softly. You are not tired, father?"

"Tired!" echoed Caleb with a great burst of animation. "What should tire
me, Bertha? _I_ was never tired. What does it mean?"

To give the greater force to his words, he checked himself in an
involuntary imitation of two half-length stretching and yawning figures
on the mantel-shelf, who were represented as in one eternal state of
weariness from the waist upwards; and hummed a fragment of a song. It
was a Bacchanalian song, something about a Sparkling Bowl. He sang it
with an assumption of a Devil-may-care voice, that made his face a
thousand times more meagre and more thoughtful than ever.

"What! You're singing, are you?" said Tackleton, putting his head in at
the door. "Go it! _I_ can't sing."

Nobody would have suspected him of it. He hadn't what is generally
termed a singing face, by any means.

"I can't afford to sing," said Tackleton. "I'm glad _you_ can. I hope
you can afford to work too. Hardly time for both, I should think?"

"If you could only see him, Bertha, how he's winking at me!" whispered
Caleb. "Such a man to joke! You'd think, if you didn't know him, he was
in earnest--wouldn't you now?"

The Blind Girl smiled and nodded.

"The bird that can sing and won't sing must be made to sing, they say,"
grumbled Tackleton. "What about the owl that can't sing, and oughtn't to
sing, and will sing; is there anything that _he_ should be made to do?"

"The extent to which he's winking at this moment!" whispered Caleb to
his daughter. "Oh, my gracious!"

"Always merry and light-hearted with us!" cried the smiling Bertha.

"Oh! you're there, are you?" answered Tackleton. "Poor Idiot!"

He really did believe she was an Idiot; and he founded the belief, I
can't say whether consciously or not, upon her being fond of him.

"Well! and being there,--how are you?" said Tackleton in his grudging
way.

"Oh! well; quite well! And as happy as even you can wish me to be. As
happy as you would make the whole world, if you could!"

"Poor Idiot!" muttered Tackleton. "No gleam of reason. Not a gleam!"