And then another offence had come to light in which the Molletts
were both concerned. Since their arrival in South Main Street they
had been excellent customers--indeed quite a godsend, in this light,
to Fanny, who had her own peculiar profit out of such
house-customers as they were. They had paid their money like true
Britons,--not regularly indeed, for regularity had not been
desired, but by a five pound now, and another in a day or two, just
as they were wanted. Nothing indeed could be better than this, for
bills so paid are seldom rigidly scrutinized. But of late, within
the last week, Fanny's requests for funds had not been so promptly
met, and only on the day before her visit to Kanturk she had been
forced to get her father to take a bill from Mr. Mollett senior for
20 l. at two months' date. This was a great come-down, as both Fanny
and her father felt, and they had begun to think that it might be
well to bring their connexion with the Molletts to a close. What if
an end had come to the money of these people, and their bills should
be dishonoured when due? It was all very well for a man to have
claims against Sir Thomas Fitzgerald, but Fanny O'Dwyer had already
learnt that nothing goes so far in this world as ready cash.

"They do have business, I suppose," said Fanny.

"It won't be worth much, I'm thinking," said Mrs. O'Dwyer, "when
they can't pay their weekly bills at a house of public
entertainment, without flying their names at two months' date."

Mrs. O'Dwyer hated any such payments herself, and looked on them as
certain signs of immorality. That every man should take his drop of
drink, consume it noiselessly, and pay for it immediately--that was