"H'are yer witing for some 'un?" demanded the unprepossessing youth, whose name it is almost a needless formality to announce was Isaac.
"What is that to you, sir?" replied the gentleman, haughtily, contemptuously regarding his questioner.
"W'y, sir, Jine harsked me--"
"Oh, Jane sent you then?"
"Ha!" cried the younger man, triumphantly. "Hi wuz sure yer wuz the cove. There hain't no doubt habout it now."
"Perhaps you will be kind enough to inform me as to the reason for this sudden ebullition of delight?" said the gentleman, puzzled by the youth's behavior, and, if not alarmed, not exactly at ease as to the probable developments of the immediate future.
If his eyes had been a trifle more used to the semi-darkness of the street, particularly at the places midway between the flickering lanterns, on whose incompetent illumination depended the lighting of the great city after nightfall, the elegant stranger would have perceived that his interrogator was not alone. Several little groups had emerged from convenient doorways and cellars, and, clustered in the denser shadows for temporary concealment, awaited a prearranged signal to advance. These sinister-looking individuals were armed with weapons still more sinister,--knotty cudgels, heavy canes, in one instance an axe handle and in another a spade, new and unsullied as yet by labor.
"Ho, Hi 'll be kind henuff, don't 'ee fear," sneered Isaac, and with a quick movement he snatched his felt hat from his bullet head and slapped it viciously across the face of his companion.
Immediately he received a blow on the chin straight from the shoulder of the insulted gallant, which dropped him, an inert bundle of clothing, in the filth of the gutter.
"Down with the swell!" yelled an enthusiastic lad, armed with an empty quart bottle, as the crowd surged forward from both sides, scattering across the street to cut off all chance of their game's escape.