a start of surprise,--

"Do you mean to tell me, Daniel, that you've been mean enough to take
advantage of that boy who has to support his widowed mother, and to hire
him for half the wages he's worth, just because he didn't know any
better? And then you come home here and boast of it! Have you no
conscience?"

The squire was so taken aback by this unexpected attack that at first he
hardly knew how to meet it. Should he lecture his wife for her
presumption in meddling in his affairs, which were quite beyond her
comprehension as a woman, or should he make light of the matter and laugh
it off? After a moment's reflection he decided on the latter course.

"Hoity, toity, Mrs. Eagleson! but what's set you so suddenly on fire?
Business is business, you know, and if Frank Kingston did not know enough
to ask for more wades, it wasn't my concern to enlighten him."

Mrs. Eagleson rose from her chair and came over and stood in front of her
husband, pointing her long, thin forefinger at him as, with a trembling
yet scornful voice, she addressed him thus,--

"Daniel, how you can kneel down and ask the blessing of God upon such
doings is beyond me, or how your head can lie easy on your pillow when
you know that you are taking the bread out of that poor lone widow's
mouth it is not for me to say. But this I will say, whether you like it
or not: if you are not ashamed of yourself, I am for you." And before the
now much-disturbed squire had time to say another word in his defence the
speaker had swept indignantly out of his presence and hastened to her own
room, there to throw herself down upon the bed and burst into a passion