“Well, but you'll see me rightified?”
“Hand the money, ma'am; do you know who you're speaking to? The senior of the office.”
On receiving the money, the honest senior whispers to the honest officer of the night—“A crown from both, that is, half from each; and now act as you like; but if you take the widow's charge, we'll have a free plate, at all events, whenever we call to see her, you know.”
Honest Ned, feeling indignant that he was not himself the direct recipient of the bribes, and also anxious to win favor in the widow's eyes, took the charge against Mr. Gray, who was very soon locked up, with the “miscellanies,” in the black hole, until bail could be procured.
On finding that matters had gone against him, Gray, who, although unaffected in speech, was yet rather tipsy, assumed a look of singular importance, as if to console himself for the degradation he was about to undergo; he composed his face into an expression that gave a ludicrous travesty of dignity.
“Well,” said he, with a solemn swagger, nodding his head from side to side as he spoke, in order to impress what he uttered with a more mysterious emphasis—“you are all acting in ignorance, quite so; little you know who the person is that's before you; but it doesn't signify—I am somebody, at all events.”
“A gentleman in disguise,” said a voice from the black hole. “You'll find some of your friends here.”
“You are right, my good fellow—you are perfectly right;” said Ambrose, nodding with drunken gravity, as before; “high blood runs in my veins, and time will soon tell that; I shall stand and be returned for the town of Ballytrain, as soon as there comes a dissolution; I'm bent on that.”
“Bravo! hurra! a very proper member you'll make for it,” from the black hole.
“And I shall have the Augean stables of these corrupt offices swept of their filth. Ned, the scoundrel, shall be sent to the right about; Mr. Darby, for his honesty, shall have each wrist embraced by a namesake.”