"If you had been in the house you could have kept an eye on him.
There, again, my wrong deed finds me out. Matabel, it's my
solemn conviction that there's no foolishness men won't be up
to, especially widowers. They've been kept in order so long
that they break out when their wives are dead. Have you ever seen
a horse as has been clipped and kept all winter on hay in the
stables when he chances to get out into a meadow, up go his heels,
he turns frisky, gallops about, and there's no catching him
again--not even with oats. He prefers the fresh grass and his
freedom. That's just like widowers; or they're ginger beer
bottles, very much up, wi' their corks out. What a pity it is
Providence has given men so little common sense! Well, I'll see
to that matter of the trusteeship, and the little man shall have
a hundred pounds as a stand-by in the chance his father may have
fooled away his own money."

CHAPTER XXXI.

SURPRISES.

Jonas Kink not only raised no objection to having an entertainment
at the baptism of his child, but he expressed his hearty desire
that nothing should be spared to repay the gossips for what they
had done to assist the infant into the Christian Church, by feeding
them well, and giving them what they valued more highly, something
to drink.

Mehetabel was gratified, and hoped that this was a token that,
rude as his manner was, he would gradually unbend and become
amiable. On the day of the christening, Bideabout was in a bustle,
he passed from one room to another to see that all was in order;
he rubbed his palms and laughed to himself. Occasionally his eyes
rested on Sally Rocliffe, and then there was a malicious twinkle
in them. There was little affection lost between the two. Neither
took pains to conciliate the other. Each commented freely on
those characteristics of the other which were in fact common to
both.

In his ambition to make a man of comparative substance of his son
Jonas, the father had not dealt liberally by his daughter, and
this had rankled in Sarah's heart. She had irritated her brother
by continually raking up this grievance, and assuring him that a
brother with natural feeling would, out of generosity of his heart,
make amends for the injustice of the father.

Jonas had not the slightest intention of doing anything of the
sort, and this he conveyed to Sarah in the most bald and offensive
manner possible. For twenty years, ever since the father's death,
these misera