Luckily for Charley’s comfort, he now discovered that the supposed blunderbuss was Peter Faber’s leg, and that the little man had it leveled like a gun, in the vain attempt to pull a Wellington boot over that which already encased his foot. He sighed and tugged, and sighed and tugged again. The effort was bootless. He could not, to use his own words, make it “shute.” The first pair, which already occupied the premises, would not be prevailed upon to admit of interlopers, and Peter’s pulling and hauling were in vain.
It was the banging of Peter’s back against the front door of Mrs. Sniggs’s mansion that had so alarmed the family; and now as he talked, he hopped across the pavement, still tugging at the boot, and took his place upon the fire-plug.
“Pshaw!—baint it hot!” said Peter. “Drat these boots! they’ve been eating green presimmings. I guess their mouths are all drawed up, just as if they wanted to whistle ‘Hail Kerlumby.’ They did fit like nothing when I tried ’em on this morning; but now I might as well pull at the door-handle and try to poke my foot through the key-hole. My feet couldn’t have growed so much in a single night, or else my stockings would have been tore; and I’m sure these are my own legs and nobody else’s, because they are as short as ever and as bandy. Besides, I know it’s me by the patches on my knees. That’s the way I always tell.”
“Are you quite sure,” inquired the watch, “that you didn’t get swopped as you came up the street? You’ve got boot, somehow or other. But come, now,” added he authoritatively, and putting on the dignity that belongs to his station, “quit being redickalis, and tell us what’s the meaning of sich goin’s on in a white man, who ought to be a credit to his fetching up. If you’re a gentleman’s son, always be genteel, and never cut up shindies or indulge in didoes. What are you doing with them ’are boots? That’s the question, Mr. Speaker.”
“Doing with my boots? What could I do without my boots, watchy?” added Peter, in tones of the deepest solemnity, as he laid his boots upon his lap and smoothed them down with every token of affection. “Watchy, though you are a watchy, you’ve got a heart with the sensibilities in it—nothing of the brickbat about you, is there, watchy? If you are ugly to look at, it’s not your fault, and it’s not your fault that you’re a watchy. I can see with half an eye that you’re a man with feelings; and you know as well as I do that we must have something to love in this world—you love your rattle—I love my boots—better nor they love me, I’m afraid,” and Peter grew plaintive.
The watchman, however, shook his head with an expression of “duberousness,” which, like the celebrated nod of Lord Burleigh, seemed to signify a great deal relative to the thoughts existing within the head that was thus shaken. It vibrated, as it were, between opinions, oscillating to the right, under the idea that Peter Faber was insane from moral causes, and pendulating to the left with the impression that he was queer perchance from causes which come upon the table of liquid measure.
Peter’s thoughts, however, were too intent upon the work he had in hand and desired to get on foot, to pay attention to any other insinuation than that of trying to insinuate his toes into the calf-skin. Sarcastic glances and nods of distrust were thrown away upon him. He asked no other solace than that of bringing his sole in contact with the sole of his new boot. On this his soul was intent.
“It’s not a very genteel expression, I know,” said the nocturnal guardian, “and it may seem to be rather a personal insinivation, though I only ask it in a professional way, and not because I want to know as a private citizen—no, it’s in my public campacity, that I think you have been drinking—I think so as a watchman, not as David Dumps. Isn’t you a leetle corned?”
“Corned! No—look at my foot—nor bunioned either,” replied Peter, as he commenced another series of tugging at the straps; and with a look of suspicion, he added, “That tarnal bootman must have changed ’em. He’s guv me some baby’s boots. But never mind—boots was made to go on, and go on they must, if I break my back a driving into ’em. Hurra!” shrieked our hero, “bring on your wild cats!”
With this exclamation—which amounts with those who use it, to a determination to do or die—Peter screwed up his visage and his courage to what may be truly denominated “the terrible feet,” and put forth his whole strength. Every nerve was strained to its utmost tension; the tug was tremendous; but alas! Cæsar was punctured as full of holes as a cullender, by those whom he regarded as his best friends; many others have been stuck in a vital part by those who were their intimate cronies, and how could Peter Faber hope to escape the treachery by which all great men are begirt? When exerting the utmost of his physical strength, the traitorous straps gave way. Two simultaneous cracks were heard; a pair of heels, describing a short curve, flashed through the air, and Peter, with the rapidity of lightning, turned a series of backward somersets from the fire-plug, and went whizzing like a wheel across the street. Now the half-donned boot appeared uppermost, and again his head followed his heels, as if for very rage he was trying to bite the hinder part of his shins, or sought to hide his mortification at his failure, not only by swallowing his boots, but likewise by gobbling up his whole body.