He was a brave little fellow, and when he saw a great crowd of people rushing on and crying, “Stop thief;” and when he felt himself caught up in the arms of a strange man, and hurried along with the rest, he only supposed some frolic was afoot, and he laughed and shouted, “Top Teef!” with all the strength of his baby lungs.
But soon the fumes of the chloroform overpowered him, and his head dropped on the shoulder of his captor.
Black Bill, keeping the old shawl over the child, taking his way through the darkened streets and lanes, at length bore his prize safely to Number Nine, Blood Alley.
He hurried up-stairs to the attic room and placed the still unconscious child in the arms of the beldam, who was there seated in her only chair.
“There, Peg! uncover him quick and do some’at to bring the life back to him,” said Black Bill, a little nervously, as he himself with eager hands helped to relieve the boy of the shawl.
“Meg!” called the crone to her granddaughter, “fetch a cup of water here. Bill, run and fetch a little rum.”
Meg, who was idling about the place, ran and fetched a cup of water from the nearest room-neighbor.
Mother Rooter dipped her fingers in the cup and sprinkled it in the boy’s face. The air had already half revived him, and the water completed the work. With a gasp and a sneeze the little fellow awoke.
They gathered around him, those wretches, like a pack of wolves around a lamb.
One tore off his pearl and turquoise necklace; another seized his hat and feather; another his sash; another his jeweled armlets. What a prize!