Wordsworth. Still silent? Hush! A gnat drones its tiny trump between the curtains. Ubi flos, ibi apis. Suddenly Jericho is assured; and with two long, soft strides, is at his own side of the bed. Sabilla is evidently in a sound, deep, sweet sleep. Untucking the bed, and making himself the thinnest slice of a man, Jericho slides between the sheets. And there he lies, feloniously still; and he thinks to himself—being asleep, she cannot tell how late I came to bed. At all events, it is open to a dispute; and that is something.

“Mr. Jericho, when can you let me have some money?”

With open eyes, and clearly ringing every word upon the morning air, did Mrs. Jericho repeat this primal question.

And what said Jericho? With a sudden qualm at the heart, and with thick, stammering tongue, he answered—“Why, my dear, I thought you were sound asleep.”

[Pg 14]

[Pg 14]

“I should be very happy if, like some people, I could sleep, Mr. Jericho. I should be very glad indeed if, like some people, I could leave the house and take my pleasure, and run into every sort of extravagance. But no! I must remain at home. But I tell you this, Mr. Jericho, I have made my mind up. Lying here, and being bitten by the gnats as I have been”—

“I’m sure, I’m very—very sorry”—

“Not you, indeed. No—no. You don’t care how I’m bitten; or, for that matter, who bites me. But that is not what I was going to say. What I was going to observe is this—Neither you nor any man in this world shall make a cat’s-paw of me.”

“I never thought of it. Never entered my head,” said Jericho, screwing his skull into the pillow.

“Nothing but a cat’s-paw, and I’m not come to that. I was deceived at the altar,” said Mrs. Jericho: “grossly, shamefully played upon; and I have been deceived ever since.”

“For the matter of that,” cried Jericho, a little doggedly, “I was deceived too. Of course, everybody said you’d money; and so I was deceived—grossly deceived,” cried Jericho, melting a little with a sense of his injury. “I don’t want to return to the subject, Mrs. Jericho. But of course I thought you rich.”

“Mercenary wretch! If the girls were only stirring, I’d get up,” was the threat. “I’m sure it’s time.”

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