"I don't propose to multiply words about it," said Mr. Craven, with an assumption of dignity. "If you had behaved well, you might have stayed. Now you must go."
"Must I?" sniffed Katy, indignantly. "Must I, indade?"
"Yes, you must, and the less fuss you make about it the better."
Mr. Craven supposed that he had the decided advantage, and that Katy, angry as she was, would eventually succumb to his authority. But he did not know the independent spirit of Catherine O'Grady, whose will was quite as resolute as his own.
"And ye think I'm goin' at your word--I that's been in the family since Master Frank was a baby?"
"I am sorry for you, Katy," said Mr. Craven, in triumphant magnanimity. "But I cannot permit a servant to remain in my house who is guilty of the gross impropriety of insulting me."
"I know why you want to get rid of me," said Katy, nodding her head vigorously.
"Why?" asked Craven, with some curiosity.
Mr. Craven started. How had his secret leaked out?
"Mane! I mane that I saw you lavin' the p'isoned mate for the dog three days agone, and if it hadn't been for me he'd have eaten it, and the poor creetur would be stiff in death."
"He did eat it. I saw him," said Mr. Craven, hastily.
"No, he didn't. It wasn't the same mate!" said Katy, triumphantly.
"It was a piece I cut off and carried out to him," said Katy. "The other I wrapped up in a piece of paper, and buried it in the field."
Mr. Craven's eyes were opened. Pompey's cast-iron constitution was explained. After all, he was not that natural phenomenon which Mr. Craven had supposed him to be. But he was angry at Katy's interference no less.
"Say no more," he said. "You must go. You have no right to interfere with my plans."
"Say no more? Won't I be tellin' the misthress and Master Frank how you tried to kill the poor dog, first with p'ison, and nixt wid a pistol?"
There was something in this speech that made Mr. Craven hesitate and reflect.
He knew that Katy's revelation would provoke Frank, and make him an enemy, and he feared the boy's influence on his mother, particularly as he was concocting plans for inducing his wife to place some of her money in his hand under pretext of a new investment. He must be careful not to court hostile influences, and after all, he resolved to bear with Katy, much as he disliked her.