Tackleton couldn't get on at all; and the more
cheerful his intended bride became in Dot's society,
the less he liked it, though he had brought them to-
gether for that purpose. For he was a regular dog
in the manger, was Tackleton; and when they laughed
and he couldn't, he took it into his head, immediately,
that they must be laughing at him.
'Ah May!' said Dot. 'Dear, dear, what changes!
To talk of those merry school-days makes one young
again.'
'Why, you an't particularly old, at any time; are
you?' said Tackleton.
'Look at my sober plodding husband there,' re-
turned Dot. 'He adds twenty years to my age at
least. Don't you, John?'
'Forty,' John replied.
'How many you'll add to May's, I'm sure I don't
know,' said Dot, laughing. 'But she can't be much
less than a hundred years of age on her next birth-
day.'
'Ha ho!' laughed Tackleton. Hollow as a drum,
that laugh though. And he looked as if he could
have twisted Dot's neck, comfortably.
'Dear dear!' said Dot. 'Only to remember how
we used to talk, at school, about the husbands we
would choose.
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