“And how’s my boy, Betty?” asked Mrs. Boffin, sitting down beside her.

“He’s bad! He’s bad!” said Betty. “I begin to be afeerd he’ll not be yours any more than mine. All others belonging to him have gone to the Power and the Glory, and I have a mind that they’re drawing him to them⁠—leading him away.”

“No, no, no,” said Mrs. Boffin.

“I don’t know why else he clenches his little hand as if it had hold of a finger that I can’t see. Look at it,” said Betty, opening the wrappers in which the flushed child lay, and showing his small right hand lying closed upon his breast. “It’s always so. It don’t mind me.”

“Is he asleep?”

“No, I think not. You’re not asleep, my Johnny?”