Hitherto Robinson had not said a word; but at this moment he thought
it right to interfere. "Maryanne!" he said,--and, in pronouncing the
well-loved name, he threw into it all the affection of which his
voice was capable,--"Maryanne!"

"'Miss Brown' would be a deal properer, and also much more pleasing,
if it's all the same to you, sir!"

How often had he whispered "Maryanne" into her ears, and the dear
girl had smiled upon him to hear herself so called! But he could
not remind her of this at the present moment. "I have your father's
sanction," said he--

"My father is nothing to me,--not with reference to what young man I
let myself be called 'Maryanne' by. And going on as he is going on, I
don't suppose that he'll long be much to me in any way."

"Oh, Maryanne!" sobbed the unhappy parent.

"That's all very well, sir, but it won't keep the kettle a-boiling!"

"As long as I have a bit to eat of, Maryanne, and a cup to drink of,
you shall have the half."

"And what am I to do when you won't have neither a bit nor a cup?
That's what you're coming to, father. We can all see that. What's the
use of all them lawyers?"

"That's Jones's doing," said Robinson.

"No; it isn't Jones's doing. And of course Jones must look after
himself. I'm not partial to Jones. Everybody knows that. When Sarah
Jane disgraced herself, and went off with him, I never said a word in
her favour. It wasn't I who brought a viper into the house and warmed
it in my bosom." It was at this moment that Jones was behaving with
the most barefaced effrontery, as well as the utmost cruelty, towards
the old man, and Maryanne's words cut her father to the very soul.
"Jones might have been anywhere for me," she continued; "but there he
is downstairs, and Sarah Jane is with him. Of course they are looking
for their own."

"And what is it you want, Maryanne?"

"Well; I'll tell you what I want. My dear sainted mother's last wish
was that--I should become Mrs. Brisket!"

"And do you mean to say," said Robinson--"do you mean to say that
that is now your wish?" And he looked at her till the audacity even
of her eyes sank beneath the earnestness of his own. But though for
the moment he quelled her eye, nothing could quell her voice.

"I mean to say," said she, speaking loudly, and with her arms akimbo,
"that William Brisket is a very respectable young man, with a
trade,--that he's got a decent house for a young woman to live in,
and a decent table for