"Deuce take the Witch of Endor and you also. There's a shilling.
Go and drink yourself into a more cheery frame of mind."

Widow Anne bit the shilling with one of her two remaining teeth,
and dropped a curtsey.

"You're a good, kind gentleman," she smirked, cheered at the idea
of unlimited gin. "And when my boy Sid do come home a corpse, I
hope you'll come to the funeral, sir."

"What a raven!" said Lucy, as Widow Anne toddled away in the
direction of the one public-house in Gartley village.

"I don't wonder that the late Mr. Bolton laid her out with a
flat-iron. To slay such a woman would be meritorious."

"I wonder how she came to be the mother of Sidney," said Miss
Kendal reflectively, as they resumed their walk, "he's such a
clever, smart, and handsome young man."

"I think Bolton owes everything to the Professor's teaching and
example, Lucy," replied her lover. "He was an uncouth lad, I
understand, when your step-father took him into the house six
years ago. Now he is quite presentable. I shouldn't wonder if
he married Mrs. Jasher."

"H'm! I rather think Mrs. Jasher admires the Professor."

"Oh, he'll never marry her. If she were a mummy there might be a
chance, of course, but as a human being the Professor will never