ral--do.'

Kate hastily rose; but as she rose, Sir Mulberry caught her dress, and
forcibly detained her.

'Let me go, sir,' she cried, her heart swelling with anger. 'Do you
hear? Instantly--this moment.'

'Sit down, sit down,' said Sir Mulberry; 'I want to talk to you.'

'Unhand me, sir, this instant,' cried Kate.

'Not for the world,' rejoined Sir Mulberry. Thus speaking, he leaned
over, as if to replace her in her chair; but the young lady, making a
violent effort to disengage herself, he lost his balance, and measured
his length upon the ground. As Kate sprung forward to leave the room, Mr
Ralph Nickleby appeared in the doorway, and confronted her.

'What is this?' said Ralph.

'It is this, sir,' replied Kate, violently agitated: 'that beneath the
roof where I, a helpless girl, your dead brother's child, should most
have found protection, I have been exposed to insult which should make
you shrink to look upon me. Let me pass you.'

Ralph DID shrink, as the indignant girl fixed her kindling eye upon him;
but he did not comply with her injunction, nevertheless: for he led her
to a distant seat, and returning, and approaching Sir Mulberry Hawk, who
had by this time risen, motioned towards the door.

'Your way lies there, sir,' said Ralph, in a suppressed voice, that some
devil might have owned with pride.

'What do you mean by that?' demanded his friend, fiercely.

The swoln veins stood out like sinews on Ralph's wrinkled forehead, and
the nerves about his mouth worked as though some unendurable emotion
wrung them; but he smiled disdainfully, and again pointed to the door.

'Do you know me, you old madman?' asked Sir Mulberry.

'Well,' said Ralph. The fashionable vagabond for the moment quite
quailed under the steady look of the older sinner, and walked towards
the door, muttering as he went.

'You wanted the lord, did you?' he said, stopping short when he reached
the door, as if a new light had broken in upon him, and confronting
Ralph again. 'Damme, I was in the way, was I?'

Ralph smiled again, but made no answer.

'Who brought him to you first?' pursued Sir Mulberry; 'and how, without
me, could you ever have wound him in your net as you have?'

'The net is a large one, and rather full,' said Ralph. 'Take care that
it chokes nobody in the meshes.'

'You would sell your flesh and blood for money; yourself, if you have
not already made a bargain with the devil,' retorted the other. 'Do you
mean t