n
the counter with a crash, by weighing his fist on it, "that we've ever
had a word upon; she and me; and look what it comes to! He's going to
die here, after all. Going to die upon the premises. Going to die in our
house!"

"And where should he have died, Tugby?" cried his wife.

"In the workhouse," he returned. "What are workhouses made for?"

"Not for that!" said Mrs. Tugby, with great energy. "Not for that!
Neither did I marry you for that. Don't think it, Tugby. I won't have
it. I won't allow it. I'd be separated first, and never see your face
again. When my widow's name stood over that door, as it did for many,
many years: the house being known as Mrs. Chickenstalker's far and
wide, and never known but to its honest credit and its good report: when
my widow's name stood over that door, Tugby, I knew him as a handsome,
steady, manly, independent youth; I knew her as the sweetest looking,
sweetest tempered girl, eyes ever saw; I knew her father (poor old
creetur, he fell down from the steeple walking in his sleep, and killed
himself), for the simplest, hardest working, childest-hearted man, that
ever drew the breath of life; and when I turn them out of house and
home, may angels turn me out of heaven. As they would! And serve me
right!"

Her old face, which had been a plump and dimpled one before the changes
which had come to pass, seemed to shine out of her as she said these
words; and when she dried her eyes, and shook her head and her
handkerchief at Tugby, with an expression of firmness which it was quite
clear was not to be easily resisted, Trotty said, "Bless her! Bless
her!"

Then he listened, with a panting heart, for what should follow. Knowing
nothing yet, but that they spoke of Meg.

The gentleman upon the table-beer cask, who appeared to be some
authorized medical attendant upon the poor, was far too well accustomed,
evidently, to little differences of opinion between man and wife, to
interpose any remark in this instance. He sat softly whistling, and
turning little drops of beer out of the tap upon the ground, until there
was a perfect calm: when he raised his head and said to Mrs. Tugby, late
Chickenstalker:

"There's something interesting about the woman, even now. How did she
come to marry him?"

"Why, that," said Mrs. Tugby, taking a seat near him, "is not the least
cruel part of her story, sir. You see they kept company, she and
Richard, many years ago. When they were a young and beautif