ifferent
man."

"Well, I AM a different man," retorted the dentist, savagely. "You can't
make small of me ALWAYS."

"Well, never mind that. You know I'm not trying to make small of you.
But never mind that. Did you get a place?"

"Give me my money," exclaimed McTeague, jumping up briskly. There was
an activity, a positive nimbleness about the huge blond giant that
had never been his before; also his stupidity, the sluggishness of his
brain, seemed to be unusually stimulated.

"Give me my money, the money I gave you as I was going away."

"I can't," exclaimed Trina. "I paid the grocer's bill with it while you
were gone."

"Don't believe you."

"Truly, truly, Mac. Do you think I'd lie to you? Do you think I'd lower
myself to do that?"

"Well, the next time I earn any money I'll keep it myself."

"But tell me, Mac, DID you get a place?"

McTeague turned his back on her.

"Tell me, Mac, please, did you?"

The dentist jumped up and thrust his face close to hers, his heavy jaw
protruding, his little eyes twinkling meanly.

"No," he shouted. "No, no, NO. Do you hear? NO."

Trina cowered before him. Then suddenly she began to sob aloud, weeping
partly at his strange brutality, partly at the disappointment of his
failure to find employment.

McTeague cast a contemptuous glance about him, a glance that embraced
the dingy, cheerless room, the rain streaming down the panes of the one
window, and the figure of his weeping wife.

"Oh, ain't this all FINE?" he exclaimed. "Ain't it lovely?"

"It's not my fault," sobbed Trina.

"It is too," vociferated McTeague. "It is too. We could live like
Christians and decent people if you wanted to. You got more'n five
thousand dollars, and you're so damned stingy that you'd rather live in
a rat hole--and make me live there too--before you'd part with a nickel
of it. I tell you I'm sick and tired of the whole business."

An allusion to her lottery money never failed to rouse Trina.

"And I'll tell you this much too," she cried, winking back the tears.
"Now that you're out of a job, we can't afford even to live in your rat
hole, as you call it. We've got to find a cheaper place than THIS even."

"What!" exclaimed the dentist, purple with rage. "What, get into a worse
hole in the wall than this? Well, we'll SEE if we will. We'll just see
about that. You're going to do just as I tell you after this, Trina
McTeague," and once more he thrust his face close to hers.

"I know