“It was the deadness, there’s not a doubt about it,” returned the man. “I should have thought the deadness was a mild word for it, if it had been named to me when we brought you in. Have you got any friends, Missis?”

“The best of friends, Master.”

“I should recommend your looking ’em up if you consider ’em game to do anything for you,” said the Deputy Lock. “Have you got any money?”

“Just a morsel of money, sir.”

“Do you want to keep it?”

“Sure I do!”

“Well, you know,” said the Deputy Lock, shrugging his shoulders with his hands in his pockets, and shaking his head in a sulkily ominous manner, “the parish authorities down town will have it out of you, if you go on, you may take your Alfred David.”

“Then I’ll not go on.”