Ned nodded assent.
“And you 'members as how I met Harry and you there, and I vas all afeard at you,—'cause vy? I had never seen you afore, and ve vas a going to crack a swell's crib. And Harry spoke up for you, and said as 'ow though you had just gone on the town, you was already prime up to gammon. You 'members, eh?”
“Ay, I remember all,” said Ned; “it was the first and only house I ever had a hand in breaking into. Harry was a fellow of low habits; so I dropped his acquaintance, and took solely to the road, or a chance ingenuity now and then. I have no idea of a gentleman turning cracksman.”
“Vel, so you vent vith us, and ve slipped you through a pane in the kitchen-vindow. You vas the least of us, big as you be now; and you vent round and opened the door for us; and ven you had opened the door, you saw a voman had joined us, and you were a funked then, and stayed vithout the crib, to keep vatch vhile ve vent in.”
“Well, well,” cried Ned, “what the devil has all this rigmarole got to do with Paul?”
“Now don't be glimflashy, but let me go on smack right about. Vell, ven ve came out, you minds as 'ow the voman had a bundle in her arms, and you spake to her; and she answered you roughly, and left us all, and vent straight home; and ve vent and fenced the swag' that wery night and afterwards napped the regulars. And sure you made us laugh 'artily, Meester Pepper, when you said, says you, 'That 'ere voman is a rum blo” en.' So she vas, Meester Pepper!”
[The reader has probably observed the use made by Dummie and Mrs.
Lobkins of Irish phraseology or pronunciation, This is a remarkable
trait in the dialect of the lowest orders in London, owing, we
suppose, to their constant association with emigrants from “the
first flower of the earth.” Perhaps it is a modish affectation
among the gentry of St. Giles's, just as we eke out our mother-
tongue with French at Mayfair.]
“Oh, spare me,” said Ned, affectedly, “and make haste; you keep me all in the dark. By the way, I remember that you joked me about the bundle; and when I asked what the woman had wrapped in it, you swore it was a child. Rather more likely that the girl, whoever she was, would have left a child behind her than carried one off!” The face of Dummie waxed big with conscious importance.
“Vell, now, you would not believe us; but it vas all true. That 'ere bundle vas the voman's child,—I s'pose an unnatural von by the gemman; she let us into the 'ouse on condition we helped her off vith it. And, blow me tight, but ve paid ourselves vel for our trouble. That 'ere voman vas a strange cretur; they say she had been a lord's blowen; but howsomever, she was as 'ot-'eaded and hodd as if she had been. There vas old Nick's hown row made on the matter, and the revard for our [de]tection vas so great, that as you vas not much tried yet, Harry thought it best for to take you vith 'im down to the country, and told you as 'ow it vas all a flam about the child in the bundle!”
“Faith,” said Ned, “I believed him readily enough; and poor Harry was twisted shortly after, and I went into Ireland for safety, where I stayed two years,—and deuced good claret I got there!”