This announcement was received with loud cheers.
"Come you here, Josh," cried Jane Cummins: "I want to say a word to you."
"Well—what is it?" demanded the thief.
"Oh! nothing bad," she replied, with a significant look at her paramour Quin, who laughed heartily—as if an excellent piece of fun were in preparation.
Jane then whispered a few words in Josh Pedler's ears: the man did not, however, wait to hear all she had to say; but, bursting away from her, caught Matilda Briggs in his arms, and, giving her three or four hearty smacks with his lips, shouted, "A wedding, pals! a wedding!"
"A wedding!" repeated those who were only now let into the meaning of all the mysterious whispering that had been going on—first between Jane and Matilda—then between Jane and Mrs. Briggs—afterwards between Mrs. Briggs and her husband—and lastly between Jane and Josh Pedler:—"a wedding!" they cried: "hooray!"
"Yes—a wedding, in right good earnest!" exclaimed Josh. "But where's that drunken old file Barlow?"
"He's fallen asleep on his bed," observed Mutton-Face Sal.
"Then rouse him—and be damned to him!" cried Pedler.
Sal approached the bed, and speedily awoke the parson, who was at first mighty wroth at what he considered to be a very great liberty: but when he was informed that his services were required to perform a matrimonial ceremony—that he was to have five shillings for the job—and that a gallon of gin-punch was expected immediately, he uttered a tremendous oath by way of expressing his joy, and leapt up with as much alacrity as the fumes of liquor, which still influenced his brain, would permit him to display.