"Quick, before she comes back—pretend its fourpence halfpenny for both! Don't let him guess—it would spoil it all for him!"
"Chosen anything yet?" Denis queried. "Take your time. We are accustomed to purchasers not being able to decide between the wondrous bargains we display. Now this," he waved aloft a particularly awful tin plate on which was painted in very vivid colours a big-headed little girl caressing a dog several sizes larger than herself, "this is a wonderful artistic product—after Landseer. You might think the animal was perchance an elephant—"
"They're fourpence ha'penny for the table, and fourpence ha'penny for the cups and things, in course," the urchin interpolated with a big sigh, and never a thought for Denis's nonsense. "They beat everythink in the shop into fits!"
"This table? This tea-set? Well, you're a born shopper. Fourpence ha'penny for 'em both! Best valley I've got in the shop!"
"'And 'em over, sir!"
He held out his money in a grubby little hand that positively shook with eagerness. Then his fingers closed on it suddenly. He said with suspicion:—
"Yer sure it's for both? I ain't got no more money, so it's no use trying to bluff me into buying more'n fourpenny 'a'penny worth!"
"My dear sir, this shop is above suspicion. Twenty-four year 'ave me and Jelks kep' it!" He had seized a newspaper and was rolling it round the toys. "For twenty-four years has it stood in conscious rectitude—"
"'Ere, don't I git a box to put 'em in?" the urchin interrupted, unimpressed.
"A box, is it?"