“Quite soon enough for you. I shall not disappoint you; don’t be afraid.”
“Might you be inclined to leave any name, Captain?”
“No, not at all. I have no such intention.”
“ ‘Shall’ is summ’at of a hard word, Captain,” urged Riderhood, still feebly dodging between him and the door, as he advanced. “When you say a man ‘shall’ sign this and that and t’other, Captain, you order him about in a grand sort of a way. Don’t it seem so to yourself?”
The man stood still, and angrily fixed him with his eyes.
“Father, father!” entreated Pleasant, from the door, with her disengaged hand nervously trembling at her lips; “don’t! Don’t get into trouble any more!”
“Hear me out, Captain, hear me out! All I was wishing to mention, Captain, afore you took your departer,” said the sneaking Mr. Riderhood, falling out of his path, “was, your handsome words relating to the reward.”
“When I claim it,” said the man, in a tone which seemed to leave some such words as “you dog,” very distinctly understood, “you shall share it.”
Looking steadfastly at Riderhood, he once more said in a low voice, this time with a grim sort of admiration of him as a perfect piece of evil, “What a liar you are!” and, nodding his head twice or thrice over the compliment, passed out of the shop. But, to Pleasant he said good night kindly.
The honest man who gained his living by the sweat of his brow remained in a state akin to stupefaction, until the footless glass and the