"Look here, you know," he continued, earnestly; "I don't mind speaking
out before you. Don't you make no mistake; we're old friends, and this
is how it is. Don't you see, it's all a plant as that there Jack
Screwby got up because I as good as kicked him out--a vagabond! Wanted
to come sneaking here after--but there!" he jerked out, throwing himself
into quite a convulsion of spasmodic kicks, and scattering imaginary
turnip-seed by the handful;--"I won't talk about that no more. Only
look here, you know; you're my lodger, and I like my lodgers to look up
to their landlord with respect; so don't you make no mistake, and go for
to think as them corks ain't all square, because they air--square as
square."
Canau nodded, and lit his cigarette.
"Look here, you know," continued D. Wragg; "it's like this here--A man
comes to you and he says, `I want two score o' blue rocks'--pigeons, you
know, for trap-shooting, a thing as you furriners can't understand,
though you may come to some day. Well, he says, `I want two score o'
blue rocks, and I ain't got no money, but I've got corks;' and corks,
you know, is money, if there ain't no money, same as, when there warn't
no money, people used to swop. Well, then, we settles it in that way--
wally for wally--he has blue rocks, and I has corks; and he'll sell his
blue rocks for money to the swells, and I shall sell my corks for money
to a chap I knows as makes ginger-pop. And now, what's the matter? No
one can't say after that as them corks ain't square, can they?"
"But there was the ham," said Canau, apparently disposed to cavil.
"Don't you make no mistake about that. That there ham's sweet enough;
nothing couldn't be squarer. We like ham, we do; and Mother Winks is
mortal partial to a rasher. That's why I laid in a stock."
"Um!" said Canau, exhaling a thin cloud of smoke; "and about--about the
young man?"
"Well," said D. Wragg, looking sidewise out of his little eyes, "perhaps
I worn't quite square over that; for you see the young chap was all on
the stare about little Pellet; and as he seemed ready to buy half the
shop if she was likely to be here, I did think we might as well make a
few pounds extry; for times is werry hard, you know, Mr Canau, and
expenses is werry great: things runs up 'orrid."
Canau smoked fiercely, his yellow forehead growing knit and
angry-looking; but he did not speak.
"She didn't like it, though," continued D. Wragg; "and don't you make no
mistake: I was sorry for it afterwards, and called myself a
bumble-footed old beast when I see her a cryin'. But don't you make no
mistake; as soon as I see she didn't like it, why, bless her little
heart, I says, `Don't you go in the shop no more than you like, my pet,'
I says; and, bless her, she said she done it for poor Janet's sake."
D. Wragg seemed to be so affected by his recollections that he drew out
a pocket-handkerchief and removed a faint drop of moisture from the
corner of one eye, and another from the right side of his nose with the
stem of his pipe, Canau nodding satisfaction the while many times over--
seeming, too, more tranquil of spirit, for the puffs of smoke from his
cigarette were evolved far more slowly, and went curling gently upwards
towards the ceiling of the shop.
"I like natur, Mr Canau," said D. Wragg, "and being a spoiled child of
natur myself, I always did like natur. That little Pellet's like, as
you may say, natur's cream, all served up together. Dorgs is natur, and
all these here's natur."
D. Wragg paused, inserted his left thumb in the armhole of his vest, and
with the other hand gracefully waved round the stem of his pipe,
indicating in turn the caged prisoners around.
"I loved natur, Mr Canau, when I was a boy, and went birds'-nestin' and
ketchin' frogs instead of goin' to school, and took to the serciety of
bird-ketchers, which is men of nat'ral habits, as is in some things a
pleasure to know. It was my love of natur, Mr Canau, as fust set me
beginning trade--selling 'edge-hogs and greenfinches and nesties of
young birds in the streets; and it was natur as made me to prosper and
get into this here large way of business. I'm a London man bred and
born, though justice worn't done me in either case--for I'm wideawake to
what's wrong with me; but I'll back myself in nat'ral history to tell
anything you like, from a ork down to a tom-tit, and t'other way from a
mouse up to a helephant--if so be as they're all English. For, you see,
I never went travelling, only once, when I went round for a whole year
with Wombwell's nadgery, feeding the wild beasties, and helping to put
the carrywans straight,--and all from a love of natur, Mr Canau, though
you did get rather more natur there than you liked, 'specially as
regards smells, and bein' kep' awake of a night by the hyenas a
laughin', or them great furrin cats letting go like hooray--let alone
the other things. And that was why I left it and took to dorgs,--
selling washed pups at carriage-doors, warranted never to get no bigger.
And look here," he continued, with a grin; "if ever you should take to
that there trade, I'll put you up to a breed as the pups is the werry
smallest in natur, and washes the whitest in natur; but as for the size
they grows up to in a swell's house, where they're fed up like bloated
haristocrats, with their chicking and weal cutlet, and all that sorter
thing, and the colour they gets to--my!"
Mr D. Wragg chuckled loudly as he described this freak of "natur;" but
it was observable that the puffs of smoke from Canau's cigarette came
swiftly, as he still watched the dealer with a strange indescribable
expression.
"I love natur, Mr Canau; and that's how it is I always did love babies
and little gals, for they is natur, the prettiest bits of all. I can
always kiss them little soft bits of natur, babies--if so be as they're
clean, but to be dirty down here in Decadia, 'tis their natur to. But
you see they ain't werry fond o' being kissed by me, not being no ways
handsome. Natur never took no pains with me when she made me, you know.
I don't believe as I were ever finished, and 'cordingly I wear this
thick boot. But this here set out's quite upset me, Mr Canau, and I
don't think I shall have any more to do with dorgs. I'll keep to birds
only; for just fancy having the police in your house, and wanting to
make out as you've got a young fellow burked away somewhere, and
frightening them poor girls a'most to death! You know it's nothing but
that upset as has made poor Mother Winks slip out to get that
ginger-beer bottle of her's filled so many times. She don't generally
do more in that way than we do with our 'bacco."
"I listen to all you say," said Monsieur Canau now, for D. Wragg was
almost breathless; "but this does not explain. Where is the young man?"
"How should I know?" snarled D. Wragg, fiercely. "You don't suppose
I've had any hand in it, do you? How should I know where he is?"
"But he came here, and he is gone," said the Frenchman.
"Well, suppose he is," said D. Wragg, sulkily. "He came here, and he is
gone. How should I know where he is gone. Into the sewers or down the
river for aught I know. Do you know where he is gone?"
"Who? who? do I know?" cried Canau, excitedly. "No, no--no, no! I know
nothing. I have not seen him here or anywhere at all lately. I do not
know anything about him--nothing at all."
"No more don't I," growled D. Wragg, sullenly.
"You do not? You will swear you know nothing at all of the poor young
man?"
"Course I will," said D. Wragg, stoutly. "He's got dropped on to by
somebody; and no wonder. Dessay its part of Jack Screwby's lot; but I
ain't going to blow upon anybody. He thought that he was very cunning
in setting it down to my door so as to get it away from his; but he
didn't work much out of it anyhow. The young chap was safe to come in
for it though, flashing about streets like these here with his gold
watches and chains and rings, when there's hundreds of hungry mouths
about, and hundreds of fingers itching to snatch at 'em. And since you
come to that, don't you make no mistake; I never does nothing as ain't
honest. But, mind you, I don't say as Jack Screwby knows all about it.
I'd just as soon say you do, for you know as you didn't like his
coming."
"Who?--I?--I know? Not I--nothing at all," cried Canau, very heartily.
"But I will take one more little pinch of tabaque, Monsieur Wragg," he
said, with the extreme of cold politeness; "and then you will excuse--I
go to my promenade."
D. Wragg gazed curiously at his sallow lodger, as he prepared himself
another cigarette, till, as if feeling that he was watched, Canau
stealthily raised his eyes till they encountered those of the dealer,
when, for a few moments the two men stood, each trying to read the
other's thoughts, till, lowering his lids, Monsieur Canau lit his
cigarette, raised his pinched hat a few inches, and then slowly left the
shop.
Volume 3, Chapter III.