It was the man in the Guards who had been on duty over Johnny’s bed. The solitary old woman showed what it was, and put it up quietly in her dress. Then, she gratefully took leave of Mrs. Boffin, and of Mr. Boffin, and of Rokesmith, and then put her old withered arms round Bella’s young and blooming neck, and said, repeating Johnny’s words: “A kiss for the boofer lady.”

The Secretary looked on from a doorway at the boofer lady thus encircled, and still looked on at the boofer lady standing alone there, when the determined old figure with its steady bright eyes was trudging through the streets, away from paralysis and pauperism.