“Good-by,” said Jane. She looked him full in the face, and the blushes for which she had been waiting came in force. “You needn't go, unless you want to,” she said, softly. “I like fools better than lords.”
[ALF'S DREAM]
I'VE just been drinking a man's health,” said the night watchman, coming slowly on to the wharf and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand; “he's come in for a matter of three 'undred and twenty pounds, and he stood me arf a pint—arf a pint!”
He dragged a small empty towards him, and after planing the surface with his hand sat down and gazed scornfully across the river.
“Four ale,” he said, with a hard laugh; “and when I asked 'im—just for the look of the thing, and to give 'im a hint—whether he'd 'ave another, he said 'yes.'”
The night watchman rose and paced restlessly up and down the jetty.
“Money,” he said, at last, resuming his wonted calm and lowering himself carefully to the box again— “money always gets left to the wrong people; some of the kindest-'arted men I've ever known 'ave never had a ha'penny left 'em, while teetotaler arter teetotaler wot I've heard of 'ave come in for fortins.”
It's 'ard lines though, sometimes, waiting for other people's money. I knew o' one chap that waited over forty years for 'is grandmother to die and leave 'im her money; and she died of catching cold at 'is funeral. Another chap I knew, arter waiting years and years for 'is rich aunt to die, was hung because she committed suicide.