'Come along, then,' said Jimmy Virtue, but paused, and said, 'Stop a bit; perhaps you wouldn't mind buyin' a penn'orth o' baked taters first.'
A baked-potato can, with a man attached to it, being near them, Mr. Merrywhistle invested a penny, thinking that Jimmy Virtue intended the potatoes for supper.
'Did you ever consider,' said the eccentric old man, as they turned down the narrowest of lanes, 'that a big city was like a theaytre?'
'No, it never struck me.'
'It is, though I there's stalls, and dress-circle, and pit, and gallery, in a big city like London. The west, that's the stalls and private boxes; the north, that's the dress-circle; the south, that's the pit; the east, that's the gallery. This is the penny-gallery of the theaytre; 'taint a nice place to lay in.'
He stopped before the forms of two children--a boy and a girl--who, huddled in each other's arms, were fast asleep in a gateway. He stirred them gently with his foot; and the boy started to his feet instantaneously, wide awake, and on the alert for his natural enemies, the police. Mr. Merrywhistle was standing in the abutment of the gateway, and the boy couldn't see his face; but the well-known form of Jimmy Virtue was instantly recognised; and as the boy sank to the ground, he muttered:
'What's the good of waking us up just as we was a-gettin' warm? You wouldn't like it yourself, Mr. Wirtue, you wouldn't.'
Then he crept closer to his companion, and said sleepily:
'Come along, Bladergrass; let's turn in agin.'
The girl, who had been regarding the two dark shadows with a half-frightened, half-imploring look, as if she dreaded that they were about to turn her out of her miserable shelter, nestled in the lad's arms, and the next minute they were asleep again. All blessings were not denied to them.