ney,' replied Evenson, who really meant what he
said.

'You can't,' said Mrs. Tibbs, in despair. 'You can't--it's a register
stove.'

'Hush!' repeated John Evenson.

'Hush--hush!' cried somebody down-stairs.

'What a d-d hushing!' said Alfred Tomkins, who began to get rather
bewildered.

'There they are!' exclaimed the sapient Wisbottle, as a rustling noise
was heard in the store-room.

'Hark!' whispered both the young men.

'Hark!' repeated Mrs. Tibbs and Evenson.

'Let me alone, sir,' said a female voice in the store-room.

'Oh, Hagnes!' cried another voice, which clearly belonged to Tibbs, for
nobody else ever owned one like it, 'Oh, Hagnes--lovely creature!'

'Be quiet, sir!' (A bounce.)

'Hag--'

'Be quiet, sir--I am ashamed of you. Think of your wife, Mr. Tibbs. Be
quiet, sir!'

'My wife!' exclaimed the valorous Tibbs, who was clearly under the
influence of gin-and-water, and a misplaced attachment; 'I ate her! Oh,
Hagnes! when I was in the volunteer corps, in eighteen hundred and--'

'I declare I'll scream. Be quiet, sir, will you?' (Another bounce and a
scuffle.)

'What's that?' exclaimed Tibbs, with a start.

'What's what?' said Agnes, stopping short.

'Why that!'

'Ah! you have done it nicely now, sir,' sobbed the frightened Agnes, as a
tapping was heard at Mrs. Tibbs's bedroom door, which would have beaten
any dozen woodpeckers hollow.

'Mrs. Tibbs! Mrs. Tibbs!' called out Mrs. Bloss. 'Mrs. Tibbs, pray get
up.' (Here the imitation of a woodpecker was resumed with tenfold
violence.)

'Oh, dear--dear!' exclaimed the wretched partner of the depraved Tibbs.
'She's knocking at my door. We must be discovered! What will they
think?'

'Mrs. Tibbs! Mrs. Tibbs!' screamed the woodpecker again.

'What's the matter!' shouted Gobler, bursting out of the back
drawing-room, like the dragon at Astley's.

'Oh, Mr. Gobler!' cried Mrs. Bloss, with a proper approximation to
hysterics; 'I think the house is on fire, or else there's thieves in it.
I have heard the most dreadful noises!'

'The devil you have!' shouted Gobler again, bouncing back into his den,
in happy imitation of the aforesaid dragon, and returning immediately
with a lighted candle. 'Why, what's this? Wisbottle! Tomkins!
O'Bleary! Agnes! What the deuce! all up and dressed?'

'Astonishing!' said Mrs. Bloss, who had run down-stairs, and taken Mr.
Gobler's arm.

'Call Mrs. Tibbs directly, somebody,' said Gobler, t