"Who's there?" cried the deep, sepulchral voice of Old Death, as he started from the arm-chair in which he had been taking a nap.
"It's only two of your friends," returned Tim the Snammer; "and as friends you had better treat us, too—or it'll be the wuss for you."
"I don't know that I ever treated you in any way but as friends," said old Death, glancing somewhat uneasily from the one to the other. "As for you, Tim—I can guess why you're angry with me; but I wasn't at liberty—I wasn't my own master, I can assure you—on that Saturday when I promised to get you out of the Jug; or I should have kept my word. But it's too long a story to tell you now—even if I was disposed to do so; and so the shortest way to make us all right, is for me to give you back the money that was placed in my hands by Josh Pedler."
"And what'll pay me for the two months of quod that I had all through you, you cheating old fence?" demanded Tim Splint, placing his back against the door in a determined manner.
"I couldn't help it, Tim—I couldn't help it," returned Old Death with a hideous grin. "And may be—may be," he added, with the hesitation habitual to him, "I can put something in your way, that will make up for the past."
"Well—that looks like business, at all events," observed Tim, exchanging a rapid glance with his companion; for it struck the two robbers at the same moment, that they should perhaps act prudently to join Old Death in any enterprise which he might have in hand, and then plunder him afterwards—provided that the affair he had to propose, gave promise of a better booty than that which they stood the immediate chance of obtaining from him.
Old Death looked leisurely round the small, mean, and ill-furnished room, as much as to say, "What can you hope to get out of me?"—for the meaning of the glances which he had observed to pass between the two robbers, was perfectly well understood by him.
"Is the business you hinted at for to-night?" demanded Josh Pedler, after a brief pause.
"For to-night," replied Benjamin Bones. "But sit down, my good friends, and may be I can find a dram of brandy in the bottle for you."
"Thank'ee, we'll stand, old chap," said the Snammer; "but we shan't refuse the bingo, for all that."