dn't you?'

'No!' snarled Arthur Gride.

'Oh!' rejoined Ralph, 'I thought you did. Well! Handsome or not
handsome, to this old man there comes a young fellow who casts all
manner of fierce defiances in his teeth--gums I should rather say--and
tells him in plain terms that his mistress hates him. What does he do
that for? Philanthropy's sake?'

'Not for love of the lady,' replied Gride, 'for he said that no word of
love--his very words--had ever passed between 'em.'

'He said!' repeated Ralph, contemptuously. 'But I like him for one
thing, and that is, his giving you this fair warning to keep your--what
is it?--Tit-tit or dainty chick--which?--under lock and key. Be careful,
Gride, be careful. It's a triumph, too, to tear her away from a gallant
young rival: a great triumph for an old man! It only remains to keep her
safe when you have her--that's all.'

'What a man it is!' cried Arthur Gride, affecting, in the extremity of
his torture, to be highly amused. And then he added, anxiously, 'Yes; to
keep her safe, that's all. And that isn't much, is it?'

'Much!' said Ralph, with a sneer. 'Why, everybody knows what easy things
to understand and to control, women are. But come, it's very nearly time
for you to be made happy. You'll pay the bond now, I suppose, to save us
trouble afterwards.'

'Oh what a man you are!' croaked Arthur.

'Why not?' said Ralph. 'Nobody will pay you interest for the money, I
suppose, between this and twelve o'clock; will they?'

'But nobody would pay you interest for it either, you know,' returned
Arthur, leering at Ralph with all the cunning and slyness he could throw
into his face.

'Besides which,' said Ralph, suffering his lip to curl into a smile,
'you haven't the money about you, and you weren't prepared for this, or
you'd have brought it with you; and there's nobody you'd so much like to
accommodate as me. I see. We trust each other in about an equal degree.
Are you ready?'

Gride, who had done nothing but grin, and nod, and chatter, during this
last speech of Ralph's, answered in the affirmative; and, producing from
his hat a couple of large white favours, pinned one on his breast, and
with considerable difficulty induced his friend to do the like. Thus
accoutred, they got into a hired coach which Ralph had in waiting, and
drove to the residence of the fair and most wretched bride.

Gride, whose spirits and courage had gradually failed him more and more
as they approached nea