Presently one came along the centre of Bell Yard, who seemed just the sort of person.
"Boy, boy!" cried Mrs. Stag.
"Well, old 'un," he replied, "what do you bring it in—Wilful Murder with the chill off, or what?"
"Don't be owdacious. If you want to earn a penny—I mean a halfpenny—honestly, take this shilling and this bottle, and go to the corner, and get a quartern of the best."
"The best what?"
"Oh, you foolish boy. Gin, of course; but remember that my eye is upon you."
It was well that Mrs. Stag spoke in the singular regarding her optical organ, for she had but one. The boy professed a ready acquiescence, and away he went, with the bottle and the shilling. Alas! Mrs. Stag was left lamenting. He came not back again, and from thenceforward Mrs. Stag lost the small amount of faith she had had in boyhood. The well-concocted scheme had failed, and there she was, with countless halfpence in the till, and so thirsting for strong water, that she was half inclined to make a grand rush herself to the nearest public-house, and chance any one in the interim helping themselves to the pies ad lib.
But she was not reduced to that extremity. Suddenly the window was darkened by a shadow, and through one of the topmost panes an immense hideous face, with an awful grin upon it, confronted Mrs. Stag.
The good lady was fascinated—not in an agreeable sense, but in quite the reverse—she could not take her eyes from off the hideous gigantic face, as it placed itself close to the frame of ill-made greenish glass, in order to get a good view into the shop.
"Goodness gracious, it's Luficer himself!" said Mrs. Stag. "I'm a lost woman. Quite a lost woman. I'm undone. It's Luficer himself, I'm sure and certain!"