t home to
bed, and on his way out next morning wondered how the party went
off. He thought it hardly worth while to call at the shop for his
provisions at that hour, Donn and his daughter being probably not up,
if they caroused late the night before. However, he found in passing
that the door was open, and he could hear voices within, though the
shutters of the meat-stall were not down. He went and tapped at the
sitting-room door, and opened it.

"Well--to be sure!" he said, astonished.

Hosts and guests were sitting card-playing, smoking, and talking,
precisely as he had left them eleven hours earlier; the gas was
burning and the curtains drawn, though it had been broad daylight
for two hours out of doors.

"Yes!" cried Arabella, laughing. "Here we are, just the same. We
ought to be ashamed of ourselves, oughtn't we! But it is a sort of
housewarming, you see; and our friends are in no hurry. Come in, Mr.
Taylor, and sit down."

The tinker, or rather reduced ironmonger, was nothing loath, and
entered and took a seat. "I shall lose a quarter, but never mind,"
he said. "Well, really, I could hardly believe my eyes when I looked
in! It seemed as if I was flung back again into last night, all of a
sudden."

"So you are. Pour out for Mr. Taylor."

He now perceived that she was sitting beside Jude, her arm being
round his waist. Jude, like the rest of the company, bore on his
face the signs of how deeply he had been indulging.

"Well, we've been waiting for certain legal hours to arrive, to
tell the truth," she continued bashfully, and making her spirituous
crimson look as much like a maiden blush as possible. "Jude and I
have decided to make up matters between us by tying the knot again,
as we find we can't do without one another after all. So, as a
bright notion, we agreed to sit on till it was late enough, and go
and do it off-hand."

Jude seemed to pay no great heed to what she was announcing, or
indeed to anything whatever. The entrance of Taylor infused fresh
spirit into the company, and they remained sitting, till Arabella
whispered to her father: "Now we may as well go."

"But the parson don't know?"

"Yes, I told him last night that we might come between eight and
nine, as there were reasons of decency for doing it as early and
quiet as possible; on account of it being our second marriage, which
might make people curious to look on if they knew. He highly
approved."

"Oh very well: I'