“You did,” replied Katie with a slight frown, “and I hope you have come to apologise for your naughty conduct.”
“Well, I can’t ’xactly say as I have come to do that, but I dessay I may as well begin that way. I’m very sorry, miss, for havin’ did you, an’ I’ve called now to see if I can’t do you again.”
Katie could not restrain a laugh at the impudence of this remark, but she immediately regretted it, because Billy took encouragement and laughed too; she therefore frowned with intense severity, and, still remembering that she meant ultimately to befriend the boy, resolved to make him in the meantime feel the consequences of his former misdeeds.
“Come, boy,” she said sharply, “don’t add impertinence to your wickedness, but let me know at once what you want with me.”
Billy was evidently taken aback by this rebuff. He looked surprised, and did not seem to know how to proceed. At length he put strong constraint upon himself, and said, in rather a gruff tone—
“Well, miss, I—a—the fact is—you know a gal named Nora Jones, don’t you? Anyhow, she knows you, an’ has said to me so often that you was a parfect angel, that—that—”
“That you came to see,” interrupted Katie, glancing at her shoulders, “whether I really had wings, or not, eh?”
Katie said this with a still darker frown; for she thought that the urchin was jesting. Nothing was further from his intention. Knowing this, and, not finding the angelic looks and tones which he had been led to expect, Billy felt still more puzzled and inclined to be cross.
“Seems to me that there’s a screw loose somewheres,” said Billy, scratching the point of his nose in his vexation. “Hows’ever, I came here to ax your advice, and although you cer’nly don’t ’ave wings nor the style o’ looks wot’s usual in ’eavenly wisiters, I’ll make a clean breast of it—so here goes.”
Hereupon the poor boy related how he had been decoyed from the Grotto—of which establishment he gave a graphic and glowing account—and said that he was resolved to have nothing more to do with Morley Jones, but meant to return to the Grotto without delay—that evening if possible. He had a difficulty, however, which was, that he could not speak freely to Nora about her father, for fear of hurting her feelings or enlightening her too much as to his true character, in regard to which she did not yet know the worst. One evil result of this was that she had begun to suspect there was something wrong as to his own affection for herself—which was altogether a mistake. Billy made the last remark with a flush of earnest indignation and a blow of his small hand on his diminutive knee! He then said that another evil result was that he could not see his way to explain to Nora why he wished to be off in such a hurry, and, worst of all, he had not a sixpence in the world wherewith to pay his fare to London, and had no means of getting one.