Her husband looked at her darkly.

“Don’t blubber.  What good does crying do?  G—! if any thing happens in this world, a woman falls to crying her eyes out, as if that would help it.”

Boniface Newt was not usually affectionate.  But there was almost a ferocity in his address at this moment which startled his wife into silence.  His daughter May turned pale as she saw and heard her father.

“I thought Abel was trial enough!” said he, bitterly; “and now the girl must fall to cutting up shines.  I tell you plainly, Nancy, if Fanny has married a beggar, a beggar she shall be.  There is some reason for a private marriage that we don’t understand.  It can’t be any good reason; and, daughter or no daughter, she shall lie in the bed she has made.”

He scowled and set his teeth as he said it.  His wife did not dare to cry any more.  May went to her mother and took her hand, while the father of the family walked rapidly up and down.

“Every thing comes at once,” said he.  “Just as I am most bothered and driven down town, this infernal business of Fanny’s must needs happen.  One thing I’m sure of—­if it was all right it would not be a private wedding.  What fools women are!  And Fanny, whom I always thought so entirely able to take care of herself, turns out to be the greatest fool of all!  This fellow’s a booby, I believe, Mrs. Newt.  I think I have heard even you make fun of him.  But to be poor, too!  To run away with a pauper-booby, by Heavens, it’s too absurd!”

Mr. Newt laughed mockingly, while the tears flowed fast from the eyes of his wife, who said at intervals, “I vow,” and “I declare,” with such utter weakness of tone and movement that her husband suddenly exclaimed, in an exasperated tone,

“Nancy, if you don’t stop rocking your body in that inane way, and shaking your hand and your handkerchief, and saying those imbecile things, I shall go mad.  I suppose this is the kind of sympathy a man gets from a woman in his misfortunes!”

May Newt looked shocked and indignant.  “Mother, I am sorry for poor Fanny,” said she.

She said it quietly and tenderly, and without the remotest reference in look, or tone, or gesture to her father.

He turned toward her suddenly.

“Hold your tongue, Miss!”

“Mamma, I shall go and see Fanny to-day,” May continued, as if her father had not spoken.  Her mother looked frightened, and turned to her deprecatingly with a look that said, “For Heaven’s sake, don’t!” Her father regarded her for a moment in amazement.

“What do you mean, you little vixen?  Let me catch you disobeying me and going to see that ungrateful wicked girl, if you think fit!”

There was a moment in which May Newt turned pale, but she said, in a very low voice,

“I must go.”

“May, I forbid your going,” said Mr. Newt, severely and loudly.

“Father, you have no right to forbid me.”