door was opened, and Bill, with a superb bow, asked his visitors into his
room.

In the interval, leisure had been given to the cracksman to remove all
trace of the wonted educational employment of his hopeful children. The
urchins were seated on the floor playing at push-pin; and the Bow-Street
officer benignly patted a pair of curly heads as he passed them, drew a
chair to the table, and wiping his forehead, sat down, quite at home.
Bill then deliberately seated himself, and unbuttoning his waistcoat,
permitted the butt-ends of a brace of pistols to be seen by his guests.
Mr. R----'s companion seemed very unmoved by this significant action. He
bent one inquiring, steady look on the cracksman, which, as Bill
afterwards said, went through him "like a gimlet through a penny," and
taking out a purse, through the network of which the sovereigns gleamed
pleasantly, placed it on the table and said,--

"This purse is yours if you will tell me what has become of a woman named
Joplin, with whom you left the village of ----, in Lancashire, in the
year 18--."

"And," put in Mr. R----, "the gentleman wants to know, with no view of
harming the woman. It will be to her own advantage to inform us where
she is."

"'Pon honour again?" said Bill.

"'Pon honour!"

"Well, then, I has a heart in my buzzom, and if so be I can do a good
turn to the 'oman wot I has loved and kep' company with, why not?"