The Real Charlotte. 253 



wish to make themselves heard, and it will yield but a 

 broken sound when it is too hardly pressed. 



" Dare to open your mouth to me again, and I'll throw 

 you out of the window after the cat ! " was what she said in 

 that choking whisper. " Ye can go out of this house to- 

 morrow and see which of your lovers will keep ye the 

 longest, and by the time that they're tired of ye, maybe 

 ye'll regret that your impudence got ye turned out of a 

 respectable house ! " She turned at the last word, and, like 

 a madman who is just sane enough to fear his own mad- 

 ness, flung out of the room without another glance at her 

 cousin. 



Susan sat on the gravel path, and in the intervals of lick 

 ing his paws in every crevice and cranny, surveyed his 

 mistress's guest with a stony watchfulness as she leaned her 

 head against the window-sash and shook in a paroxysm of 

 sobs. 



CHAPTER XXXV. 



More than the half of September had gone by. A gale 

 or two had browned the woods, and the sky was beginning 

 to show through the trees a good deal. Miss Greely re- 

 moved the sun-burned straw hats from her window, and 

 people lighted their fires at afternoon tea-time, and daily 

 said to each other with sapient gloom, that the evenings 

 were closing in very much. The summer visitors had gone, 

 and the proprietors of lodgings had moved down from the 

 attics to the front parlours, and were restoring to them their 

 usual odour of old clothes, sour bread, and apples. All the 

 Dysarts, with the exception of Sir Benjamin, were away ; 

 the Bakers had gone to drink the waters at Lisdoonvarna ; 

 the Beatties were having their yearly outing at the Sea 

 Road in Galway ; the Archdeacon had exchanged duties 

 with an Enghsh cleric, who was married, middle-aged, and 

 altogether unadvantageous, and Miss Mullen played the 

 organ, and screamed the highest and most ornate tunes in 

 company with the attenuated choir. 



The barracks kept up an outward seeming of life and 

 cheerfulness, imparted by the adventitious aid of red coats 

 and bugle-blowing, but their gaiety was superficial, and even 



