“Hall serene,” he replied, looking with cool urbanity in the doctor’s face, “fire away!”
“You’re a shoeblack, I see,” said the doctor.
“That’s my purfession.”
“Do you like it?”
“Vell, w’en it’s dirty weather, with lots o’ mud, an’ coppers goin’, I does. W’en it’s all sunshine an’ starwation, I doesn’t.”
“My friend Mr Mellon tells me that you’re a very good boy.”
Little Slidder looked at me with a solemn, reproachful air.
“Oh! what a wopper!” he said.
We both laughed at this.
“Come, Slidder,” said I, “you must learn to treat us with more respect, else I shall have to change my opinion of you.”