"I'll dream what I like without asking your leave," retorted Sally.

You are not amenable to reason," said Jack, still mildly. "Instead of being sorry and your conscience pricking you

"I'd prick 'er with my conscience if I 'ad the chance," cried the irritated Sally, bursting into loud sobs

"Hush, my poor girl," whispered Jack, in wondering alarm. He felt as impotent before the complexities of the female character as before those of his own.

The admonition but increased her sobs in volume and in intensity.

"Hush," he repeated, "you'll wake Mrs. Dawe."

The sobs ceased immediately. Supreme surprise excluded all other emotion.

66

"What, ain't she up?" gasped Sally. Then she's dead!" "Dead!" gasped her son, turning deadly pale as the horror of the situation flashed across him. Dead thus suddenly, without saying farewell to her only child !

"Impossible !" he cried.

"That's why I never yerd 'er this mornin', and that's why I never waked. For the ten yeers I've been 'ere she's allus been up at six."

"But she may be ill," urged Jack. "Ill, what rot!" cried Sally.

"She never was ill in 'er life!"

Jack had by this time recovered some of his equanimity. "What a striking illustration," he remarked to Sally, "

is of Mill's theory of unbroken experience !"

your mind

"What rot!" returned Sally. “I never 'ad a week of unbroken experience in my life. Arx missus. And we don't keep no cat, worse luck."

So saying she was rushing upstairs, when a shrill shriek of "Sally!" from the upper regions made her heart go pit-a-pat as though she had heard a voice from the grave.

"Well, did you ever?" queried Sally. As this is one of the questions which have this in common with the problems in pretentious philosophical books, that no one expects an answer to them, Jack did not give any. Besides, the Teutonic vagueness of the phraseology rendered doubtful the precise question at issue.

'Oh, you're 'ere at last,” cried Mrs. Dawe, sitting up in bed as Sally entered. Her face, massy, large, and round, like Satan's shield, was covered with discordant beads of perspiration and oil, and topped by a dirty cotton nightcap. The room was large and square, covered with discordant strips of carpet, and topped by a dirty ceiling.

"I came as quick as I could. What's a matter a-shriekin' like that?" said Sally. "I thought you was dead."

"I know you'd murder me if you could," cried Mrs. Dawe, "a-lettin' me call you for hours. You'd walk a jolly sight quicker

at my

funeral."

"What rot! You know you've got to creep along at a funeral."

N

"You hussy! To mention about my funeral, indeed! It makes my flesh creep-but I'll show you who's got most life in 'er."

Suiting the intention to the words, Mrs. Dawe tried to jump out of bed, and fell back, groaning.

"Oh, my 'ead," she moaned, "it's a-turnin' round like the merrygo-rounds in the Park."

“Oh, what's a matter, dear missus?" cried Sally anxiously, running to the bedside. "Shall I go for the doctor? Shall I fry you a bloater? Shall I

"

"Lift up my 'ead, you fool," cried Mrs. Dawe sharply, "and prop up my back. D'you think I'm going to lay down? That's better. What's the time?"

Half-past eleven," replied Sally with an air of reproachful superiority. Her audacious retroussé nose, shaded at the point by a black smear, jerked itself towards the ceiling as she made the statement.

Mrs. Dawe's eyes dilated with horror and shame, and she made another ineffectual attempt to rise. "Why didn't you wake me?" she gasped.

"When I come in at six,” replied Sally, with the childlike blandness of the Heathen Chinee," you was that sound asleep that I thinks to myself, 'Poor thing! it's a pity to wake 'er.' So I arxed Jack, and he ses, 'Can't you manage, yourself, for once? Let 'er sleep, she works so 'ard.' So I done everything as quiet as I could."

"It's just like Jack! If he'd only ha' let you wake me then, I might ha' been all right. I'll pick that little bone with him when I see 'im."

Sally bit her lips with vexation. In her anxiety to do Jack a good turn she had, like a coward, transferred the blame to his shoulders.

"It's lucky I bought everything last night,” resumed Mrs. Dawe. 66 Have you stuffed the big plum-pudding with the pennuth of plums in the brown bag under the counter, and chipped the cold potatoes, and warmed the beans in the blue dish, and- ""

"It's all done, every inch on it, missus. And I've put on that nice joint of beef for the allimud soup"The beef!" shrieked Mrs. Dawe.

beef! Why, I bought that for myself."

"The ninepenny-apenny

"It's the

"D'yer think I'm a fool?" responded Sally calmly. same beef that was in last Sunday's mock-turtle. And I've scrubbed the shop, too, so that'll save me doin' it to-morrow, the usual day, though it his aggravatin' the way people won't wipe their feet, even if they see it's just been cleaned."

"It is aggravatin'-and what always puzzled my late 'usband," put in Mrs. Dawe, mollified by the girl's zeal, "was 'ow the devil people can walk about with such innocent faces and such dirty boots. But I ain't a-goin' to lay in bed ill at my time of life; I'll try to get up."

"Oh, don't, missus, don't," cried Sally. "You're tremblin' all Over."

"I must. I ain't tremblin' a bit."

"You shan't. You're ill."

"'Ow can I be ill when there's no one to look after the bizness? It ain't nat'ral."

"There's me! And there's Jack been servin' all the mornin' and doin' a roarin' trade with the 'ot peas."

"With the 'ot peas?" cried Mrs. Dawe eagerly. "I knowed they'd take."

"But 'e's goin' out now," added Sally. "I see 'im just take 'is paint-pots. I can serve, missus."

I dunno so much," replied Mrs. Dawe suspiciously. "Owsoever, I wants a cup o' tea, 'cause there's something buzzin' inside my forred, so let Jack bring it up in a jiffy. Jack, mind, not you. Let 'im make 'aste, or I'll 'ave to come down myself."

Sally bounded downstairs, overturned Jack, who was on his knees, rushed to the cupboard, opened it, and dragged out the teacaddy, all in a minute. "Where's the teapot?" she gasped.

"You're in a great hurry, my child," observed Jack as he picked himself up. "How is Mrs. Dawe ?"

"Can't speak," panted Sally.

they?"

"But I heard her," said Jack.

66

"Drat the spoons, where are

"She said she'll be down if you don't bring her up a cup of tea at once. She thought it was made, you know. She can't get up. Oh, what shall I do?"

"Do not be so distressed," said Jack soothingly. "I dare say it's nothing serious."

66

Ain't it, oh my eye!" responded Sally. "I'm in for it if she comes down."

"Sally," screamed the voice from above, "is Jack comin with that tea ?"

"Oh, lor," murmured Sally; "and the fire not alight yet!"

"

"

Can I help you?" inquired Jack with sympathetic politeness. Quick, make the fire," Sally gasped, "while I fills the kettle and measures out the tea."

Jack hesitated.

66 Sally!" cried the voice again.

Jack rushed into the shed and reappeared in an instant laden with coal and wood.

"At last my honour is hopelessly blackened," he murmured grimly, as he caught sight of his face (which now rivalled Sally's) in the chimney-glass.

He threw his burden into the grate in a promiscuous heap, tore off a page of a newspaper which was lying on the table, ignited it, and placed it on the top of the grate. A momentary flare, and the paper was consumed.

"You

"Oh, ain't you clever?" contemptuously cried Sally, dashing in from the kitchen with a very small kettle of cold water. must put the paper under, quick."

"The fire of Revolution, too," mused Jack as he hastily lit

another sheet, "will be lit up from the bottom." Thus speaking, he set fire to the red fringe which depended from the mantelpiece, without perceiving it, and tried to ram the paper under the thickly wedged mass that stuffed up the grate.

"Lord a mussy on us," exclaimed Sally, briskly turning the kettle into a fire-engine. "Get out of the way," she exclaimed rudely. "And get a cup and saucer, quick.”

Jack Dawe sighed and meekly obeyed the maid of all work. "Jack!" cried the voice, trembling with indignation. "It's all right, missus," Sally screamed back. "Jack says you must 'ave a extra good cup, so we're a-makin' of it."

"I won't wait 'ere much longer," the voice replied with angry determination.

Sally speedily differentiated the chaotic mass in the grate, and applied a light.

Her master, a blue-and-gold cup and saucer in hand, stood anxiously surveying the scene.

As the paper blazed up, new hope was kindled in both their breasts.

But the next moment hope and the flame died away together. "I've been and wetted the sticks when I was making out the mantelpiece," cried the exasperated girl, with an oath. "Run for

some more."

"Hush!" said the horrified Jack, running to get the bundle of wood, but the admonition was lost in another cry of "Sally! Jack! Are you deaf?"

In a second the dexterous Sally had the wood in a blaze. Then arming Jack with the bellows, she hastily got everything ready for the critical moment when the kettle should boil. Jack puffed vigorously away, and produced an immense volume of smoke. Suddenly Sally uttered an exclamation. "Why, what idjuts we are! The gas!”

Quick as thought, she turned the gas on to the full, and snatching up the kettle held it over the flame. Jack looked on in helpless admiration.

"Froude is right,” he murmured.

speech."

"Action is greater than

"It's nearly done, missus,” Sally screamed; "only we're that busy in the shop.”

In a few minutes the tea was ready.

Milk, sugar, spoon, were

inserted-the fight against time had been won.

"Saved!" gasped Sally, falling exhausted into an arm-chair, as Jack, grasping the saucer tightly, began to mount the stairs with cautious rapidity.

"How an external interest takes one out of himself!" he was reflecting. "It is thus true, as Hegel says in his transcendental exposition of Christianity, that only by going out of ourselves are we saved."

At this point, having reached the top of the staircase, he attempted to ascend an imaginary step, stumbled, and let the cup go out of the saucer without being able to save it.

"O Lor'!" gasped Sally as she heard the crash. and gone and done it!"

"He's been

"Jack!" screamed Mrs. Dawe, "if you've smashed any o' the blue-and-gold service, don't come near me for love or money! Let me die in peace."

Jack hastily gathered up as many fragments as he could see, and bore them mournfully downstairs.

Sally, crushed by defeat, with pallid but firmly-set features, threw them hastily into the dust-hole. Not for a single moment did the brave girl's presence of mind desert her. Shouting out that she had fallen down and dropped a tin pan, she firmly poured out the rest of the liquid into the cup which trembled in her master's hand.

But it was too late. Mrs. Dawe's shuffling step was heard on the landing above. The old woman was unable to bear the uncertainty of the fate of the blue-and-gold service; her dauntless energy had conquered physical weakness. She was coming.

66

Cut!" whispered the devoted Sally. "Here's the paint-pots." She dragged them in hurriedly from the shed. "I'll say you went out long ago."

"Never!" replied Jack, setting them down firmly in the corner. "I will not desert you, my child. It is not your fault."

She thanked him by a look.

"Then stay here," she whispered, "and keep 'er out o' the shop till I takes down the shutters. Try to get 'er up to bed." Jack obeyed instinctively, as one always obeys the born commander.

He took up his position with his back to the glass of the door of communication, and with beating heart awaited his mother's approach.

She came like Night.

D'you call this a tin pan?" she shrieked, before she was well within the room.

Her son looked at the fragment, which she thrust into his eyes, and hung his head on his breast.

""Ow dared you touch the blue-and-gold set? Ain't I warned you a million times not to lay a finger on 'em?"

Then, looking round, her voice took a higher range with each successive discovery.

"A fire in my best room, a-spilin' all the furniture, as if the one in the kitchen ain't good enough! The gas blazin' away in broad day as if it was below!! I'm ruined!!! The paint-pots on the new carpet, and the mantelpiece set on fire!!!! And you've gone and burnt the only Free Thinker I ever loved 'cause it 'ad that picture of the Devil in his Cookshop, just to spite me!!!!! This is all one gets by bein' ill. But it's all over yer not wakin' me this mornin'. Jack, you wicked, foolish boy, you've killed your only mother."

With these ominous words, Mrs. Dawe, having by this time Overtaxed Nature's endurance, fell forwards on the sofa.

Quivering under the accusation, and acutely conscious that it