“I don’t mind looking at it,” said Wolf, after a pause, pulling the boy into the door of a shop. But Lob Torp was evidently an adept in the ways of infatuated gentlemen.

“Threepence for a look, Mister, and sixpence for to keep,” he said resolutely.

It was on the tip of Wolf’s tongue to cry, “Hand it over, boy. I’ll keep it!” But an instinct of suspicious dignity restrained him, and he assumed a noncommittal, negligent air. But under this air the ancient, sly cunning of the predatory demon began to fumble at the springs of his intention. “I’ll get Bob Weevil to show it to me,” the Machiavellian monitor whispered. “I shall have it in my hands then without being indebted to this rascally little blackmailer!”