Alf shot his finger at her like a crook in a melodrama, looking along it as it might have been a pistol and loving his pose.
"And would they believe you against me? Do you attend mass? Are you a sidesman?"
"I was confirmed Church afore ever you was," retorted Ruth with spirit. "I've as good a right to the sacraments, as you have then. And I'll take to em again if I'm druv to it—that I will!"
Something about this declaration tickled Alf. The emperor was forgotten in the naughty urchin.
"So long, then!" he tittered. "Appy au-revoir! Thank-ye for a pleasant chat. This day week you can look forward to. I'll collect me rent meself because I know you'd like me to."
He turned, and as he was going out ran into a man who was entering.
"Now then!" said a surly voice. "Who are you? O, it's you, is it?—I know all about you."
"What you know o me?" asked Alf, aggressively.
"Why, what a beauty you are."
The two men eyed each other truculently. Then Joe barged through the door. The entrance cleared, Alf went out, but as he passed on the pavement outside he beat a rat-tan on the window with insolent knuckles.