the fire. He was tall, and his legs were long. He was seven- or eight-and-twenty. Beside him, John looked about six.
Mrs Sucksby kept her eyes upon him while he yawned and rubbed his face. Then he met her gaze, and smiled.
''Well, well,'' he said. ''How''s business?''
''Pretty sweet,'' she answered. The baby lay still, and she patted it as she had used to pat me. Gentleman nodded to it.
''And this little bud,'' he said: ''is it farm, or is it family?''
''Farm, of course,'' she said.
''A he-bud, or a she-bud?''
A he-bud, bless his gums! Another poor motherless infant what I shall be bringing up by hand.''
Gentleman leaned towards her.
''Lucky boy!'' he said, and winked.
Mrs Sucksby cried, ''Oh!'' and turned pink as a rose. ''You saucebox!''
Nancy or not, he could certainly make a lady blush. We called him Gentleman, because he really was a gent—had been,
he said, to a real gent''s school, and had a father and a mother and a
jster__all swells—whose heart he had just about broke. He had had
money once, and lost it all gambling; his pa said he should never have another cent of the family fortune; and so he was obliged to get money the old-fashioned way, by thievery and dodging. He took to the life so well, however, we all said there must have been bad blood way back in that family, that had all come out in him.