eeping under her lashes at Sturk,
and sometimes telegraphing faintly to the children if they whispered too
loud--all cautious pantomime--_nutu signisque loquuntur_.

Sturk was incensed by the suspicion that Tom Toole knew something of his
losses, 'the dirty, little, unscrupulous spy and tattler.' He was
confident, however, that he could not know their extent. It was
certainly a hard thing, and enough to exasperate a better man than
Sturk, that the savings of a shrewd, and, in many ways, a self-denying
life should have been swept away, and something along with them, by a
few unlucky casts in little more than twelve months. And he such a
clever dog, too! the best player, all to nothing, driven to the wall, by
a cursed obstinate run of infernal luck. And he used to scowl, and grind
his teeth, and nearly break the keys and shillings in his gripe in his
breeches' pocket, as imprecations, hot and unspoken, coursed one another
through his brain. Then up he would get, and walk sulkily to the
brandy-flask and have a dram, and feel better, and begin to count up his
chances, and what he might yet save out of the fire; and resolve to
press vigorously for the agency, which he thought Dangerfield, if he
wanted a useful man, could not fail to give him; and he had hinted the
matter to Lord Castlemallard, who, he thought, understood and favoured
his wishes. Yes; that agency would give him credit and opportunity, and
be the foundation of his new fortunes, and the saving of him. A
precious, pleasant companion, you may suppose, he was to poor little
Mrs. Sturk, who knew nothing of his affairs, and could not tell what to
make of her Barney's eccentricities.

And so it was, somehow, when Dangerfield spoke his greeting at Sturk's
ear, and the doctor turned short round, and saw his white frizzed hair,
great glass eyes, and crooked, short beak, quizzical and sinister,
close by, it seemed for a second as if the 'caw' and the carrion-crow of
his dream was at his shoulder; and, I suppose, he showed his
discomfiture a little, for he smiled a good deal more than Sturk usually
did at a recognition.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

IN WHICH MR. IRONS RECOUNTS SOME OLD RECOLLECTIONS ABOUT THE PIED HORSE
AND THE FLOWER DE LUCE.

It was so well known in Chapelizod that Sturk was poking after Lord
Castlemallard's agency that Nutter felt the scene going on before his
eyes between him and Dangerfield like a public affront. His ire was that
of a phlegmatic ma