d story to me for sixteen dollars?"

"I did; but"--

"Oh, very well. That's all I wish to know about it. The rooms were rented
to me, and from that day became mine. Please to inform the lady and her
husband that I am here with my family, and desire them to vacate the
chambers as quickly as possible. I'm a man that knows his rights, and,
knowing, always maintains them."

"You cannot have the rooms, sir. That is out of the question," said Mrs.
Darlington, looking both distressed and indignant.

"And I tell you that I will have them!" replied Scragg, angrily.

"Peter! Peter! Don't act so," now interposed Mrs. Scragg. "There's no use
in it."

"Ain't there, indeed! We'll see. Madam"--he addressed Mrs.
Darlington--"will you be kind enough to inform the lady and gentleman who
now occupy one of our rooms"--

"Mr. Scragg!" said Mrs. Darlington, in whose fainting heart his outrageous
conduct had awakened something of the right spirit--"Mr. Scragg, I wish you
to understand, once for all, that the front room is taken and now occupied,
and that you cannot have it."

"Madam!"

"It's no use for you to waste words, sir! What I say I mean. I have other
rooms in the house very nearly as good, and am willing to take you for
something less in consideration of this disappointment. If that will meet
your views, well; if not, let us have no more words on the subject."

There was a certain something in Mrs. Darlington's tone of voice that
Scragg understood to mean a fixed purpose. Moreover, his mind caught at the
idea of getting boarded for something less than sixteen dollars a-week.

"Where are the rooms?" he asked, gruffly.

"The third story chambers."

"Front?"

"Yes."

"I don't want to go to the third story."

"Very well. Then you can have the back chamber down stairs, and the front
chamber above."

"What will be your charge?"

"Fourteen dollars."

"That will do, Peter," said Mrs. Scragg. "Two dollars a week is
considerable abatement."

"It's something, of course. But I don't like this off and on kind of
business. When I make an agreement, I'm up to the mark, and expect the same
from everybody else. Will you let my wife see the rooms, madam?"

"Certainly," replied Mrs. Darlington, and moved towards the door. Mrs.
Scragg followed, and so did all the juvenile Scraggs--the latter springing
up the stairs with the agility of apes and the noise of a dozen rude
schoolboys just freed from the terror of rod and ferule.