“Has he peached?” inquired our hero, sharply. “If he has, I’ll ring his young neck.”
“Peached! No, certainly not. What on earth could have put such a thought in your head? Peached! No, of course not!”
“Who gave notice to the bobbies, then?”
“Who? Why, a gentleman who saw you climbing ever the roofs, from one of the top windows of a house opposite.”
“Hang it all, I have been a fool! Never thought of that.”
“That’s how it was. Everybody knows that in the neighbourhood.”
“Ah, then, it won’t do to leave this place in charge of the boy, I must get some one else.”
“You have had a narrow escape, and so have I,” said his companion.
“Do they suspect that I reached the roof from your house?”
“No, I am glad to say they do not; if they had I should have been sure to have heard of it. No one, I believe, suspects you were concealed in my house—nevertheless we’ve had a narrow squeak for it.”