t honoh, seh, to come at yo' 'ouse; well, ad the end
I am yeh. I think you fine yoseff not ve'y well those days. Is that nod
the case, Mistoo Itchlin?"

"Oh, I'm well enough!" Richling ended with a laugh, somewhat
explosively. Mary looked at him with forced gravity as he suppressed it.
He had to draw his nose slowly through his thumb and two fingers before
he could quite command himself. Mary relieved him by responding:--

"No, Mr. Richling hasn't been well for some time."

Narcisse responded triumphantly:--

"It stwuck me--so soon I pe'ceive you--that you 'ave the ai' of a
valedictudina'y. Thass a ve'y fawtunate that you ah 'esiding in a
'ealthsome pawt of the city, in fact."

Both John and Mary laughed and demurred.

"You don't think?" asked the smiling visitor. "Me, I dunno,--I fine one
thing. If a man don't die fum one thing, yet, still, he'll die fum
something. I 'ave study that out, Mistoo Itchlin. 'To be, aw to not be,
thaz the queztion,' in fact. I don't ca'e if you live one place aw if
you live anotheh place, 'tis all the same,--you've got to pay to live!"

The Richlings laughed again, and would have been glad to laugh more; but
each, without knowing it of the other, was reflecting with some
mortification upon the fact that, had they been talking French, Narcisse
would have bitten his tongue off before any of his laughter should have
been at their expense.

"Indeed you have got to pay to live," said John, stepping to the window
and drawing up its painted paper shade. "Yes, and"--

"Ah!" exclaimed Mary, with gentle disapprobation. She met her husband's
eye with a smile of protest. "John," she said, "Mr. ----" she couldn't
think of the name.

"Nahcisse," said the Creole.

"Will think," she continued, her amusement climbing into her eyes in
spite of her, "you're in earnest."

"Well, I am, partly. Narcisse knows, as well as we do that there are two
sides to the question." He resumed his seat. "I reckon"--

"Yes," said Narcisse, "and what you muz look out faw, 'tis to git on the
soff side."

They all laughed.

"I was going to say," said Richling, "the world takes us as we come,
'sight-unseen.' Some of us pay expenses, some don't."

"Ah!" rejoined Narcisse, looking up at the whitewashed ceiling,
"those egspenze'!" He raised his hand and dropped it. "I _fine_ it so
_diffycul'_ to defeat those egspenze'! In fact, Mistoo Itchlin, such ah
the state of my financial emba'assment that I do not go out at