Both can't remain."

"If I were to tell this Mr. Scragg to seek another boarding-house, he would
insult me," said Mrs. Darlington.

"Strange that you would take such a fellow into your house!"

"My rooms were vacant, and I had to fill them."

"Better to have let them remain vacant. But this is neither here nor there.
If this fellow remains, we go."

And go they did on the next day. Mrs. Darlington was afraid to approach Mr.
Scragg on the subject. Had she done so, she would have received nothing but
abuse.

Two weeks afterwards, the room vacated by Mr. and Mrs. Ring was taken by a
tall, fine-looking man, who wore a pair of handsome whiskers and dressed
elegantly. He gave his name as Burton, and agreed to pay eight dollars.
Mrs. Darlington liked him very much. There was a certain style about him
that evidenced good breeding and a knowledge of the world. What his
business was he did not say. He was usually in the house as late as ten
o'clock in the morning, and rarely came in before twelve at night.

Soon after Mr. Burton became a member of Mrs. Darlington's household, he
began to show particular attentions to Miriam, who was in her nineteenth
year, and was, as we have said, a gentle, timid, shrinking girl. Though she
did not encourage, she would not reject the attentions of the polite and
elegant stranger, who had so much that was agreeable to say that she
insensibly acquired a kind of prepossession in his favor.