“Is that it, then?” said I, as I shewed her the article.
“The very leg,” said she. “There’s the wether mark and the snip off the tail, to shew me which I was to use first, and to-morrow is the great dinner day.”
“I was trusting to the string,” said I, as I held within my hand the piece by which the leg had been hung on the hook.
“And so you might,” replied she, “for it is a piece of an old window cord which was lying on the dresser, and the rest of it is still in the kitchen.”
“Is that it?”
“The very bit; I tied it with my own hands. But how, in the name of all that’s wonderful, has the leg found its way here before me?”
“Never you mind that,” said I. “You will be able to swear to the article?”
“Ay; but what am I to do for the dinner?”
“Why,” said I, “you could scarcely serve up to your master and his guests a leg of mutton that had been stolen by a sweep, and been in the Police Office. Our ‘old legs’ don’t get into high company when they leave our society.”
For the leg Bill was supplied with the “raal Durham” in the shape of twelve months’ imprisonment.