takes his horsewhip to me now and then, but I can always manage.
I say, 'If you touch me with that, then I'll NEVER tell you.' Just
pretending, you know, and he drops it as though it was red hot. Say,
Mrs. McTeague, have you got any tea? Let's make a cup of tea over the
stove."

"No, no," cried Trina, with niggardly apprehension; "no, I haven't got a
bit of tea." Trina's stinginess had increased to such an extent that it
had gone beyond the mere hoarding of money. She grudged even the food
that she and McTeague ate, and even brought away half loaves of bread,
lumps of sugar, and fruit from the car conductors' coffee-joint. She hid
these pilferings away on the shelf by the window, and often managed
to make a very creditable lunch from them, enjoying the meal with the
greater relish because it cost her nothing.

"No, Maria, I haven't got a bit of tea," she said, shaking her head
decisively. "Hark, ain't that Mac?" she added, her chin in the air.
"That's his step, sure."

"Well, I'm going to skip," said Maria. She left hurriedly, passing
the dentist in the hall just outside the door. "Well?" said Trina
interrogatively as her husband entered. McTeague did not answer. He hung
his hat on the hook behind the door and dropped heavily into a chair.

"Well," asked Trina, anxiously, "how did you make out, Mac?"

Still the dentist pretended not to hear, scowling fiercely at his muddy
boots.

"Tell me, Mac, I want to know. Did you get a place? Did you get caught
in the rain?"

"Did I? Did I?" cried the dentist, sharply, an alacrity in his manner
and voice that Trina had never observed before.

"Look at me. Look at me," he went on, speaking with an unwonted
rapidity, his wits sharp, his ideas succeeding each other quickly. "Look
at me, drenched through, shivering cold. I've walked the city over.
Caught in the rain! Yes, I guess I did get caught in the rain, and it
ain't your fault I didn't catch my death-a-cold; wouldn't even let me
have a nickel for car fare."

"But, Mac," protested Trina, "I didn't know it was going to rain."

The dentist put back his head and laughed scornfully. His face was very
red, and his small eyes twinkled. "Hoh! no, you didn't know it was going
to rain. Didn't I TELL you it was?" he exclaimed, suddenly angry again.
"Oh, you're a DAISY, you are. Think I'm going to put up with your
foolishness ALL the time? Who's the boss, you or I?"

"Why, Mac, I never saw you this way before. You talk like a d