‘Gos blesh you, ol’ fler,’ he said. ‘Why’sh years since shaw you lasht. Know old shong—
‘“‘Tish yersh since las’ we met,
And we may not meeteh again.”’
Mr. Turvey, having raised his voice and howled forth the above in a melancholy manner, here fell exhausted with the exertion and overcome by his feelings on to Mr. Jabez’s breast and wept copiously.
Mrs. Duck, alarmed at the strange operatic performance in the hall, came running out, and, beholding her drunken brother helpless in her husband’s arms, immediately began to upbraid the former in an excited and hysterical manner.
‘Oh, you good-for-nothing brute!’ she exclaimed, ‘to come here disgracing me like this! Oh, you bad man! Ain’t I done everything I could for you? Oh, you wicked wretch!’
Mrs. Duck’s feelings were working up to the screaming-point, when Jabez, alarmed lest the noise should reach the lodgers and cause a scandal, took the bull by the horns and dragged Mr. Turvey into the parlour.
‘Come in, Susan, and shut the door,’ he groaned. ‘This is dreadful—very dreadful!’
‘It isn’t my fault, Jabez,’ sobbed Mrs. Duck; ‘indeed it isn’t! I didn’t want him to come here. I was ashamed for you to see him, and I done what I could to keep him away. I’ve given him money, and food, and clothes, and it’s all gone in drink. He’s a bad man—a bad man—though he is my own flesh and blood, as the saying is. Ugh!’
This last exclamation was addressed to Mr. Turvey, whom Jabez had deposited on a chair, where he was vainly endeavouring to catch an imaginary fly with his hand—a proceeding which ended in his falling out of the chair on to the fender, and bringing down the fire-irons with a terrible clatter.