"Who--your mother?" said Jack.

"Yaas," said Billy; "worn't she jolly neither? She give me a wipin'
last night same as I never got."

And when we came to look at our queer visitor he bore about his face and
person undoubted marks of the truth of this story.

"What a shame it is!" I said to Jack. "Can't anything be done to stop
it? He'll be murdered right out one day."

"'Taint no concern of yourn!" said Billy. "But I say, governor," added
he, turning to Jack, "she are a rum 'un, she are! She was a-sayin' you
was makin' a idle young dorg of me, she says, and she'll wait upon you,
she says, and know the reason why, she says. And she says ef she
ketches me messin' about any more with my ABC, she says she'll knock the
'ed off me. But don't you mind 'er, she's on'y a-jawing!"

Jack looked a good deal troubled. He had taken upon himself the welfare
of this happy family in the court, and it seemed likely to cost him many
an uneasy moment. Only a short time before, he had told me, he had
called with Mr Hawkesbury and seen Billy's mother, just after her
release from prison, and tried to plead with her on Billy's behalf, but,
he said, you might as well talk to a griffin.

Billy appeared to be oppressed with no cares on the subject. "It's that
there penny bang," said he, "as she's got her back up agin. I told her
as I was a shovin' my coppers in there, and she says she'll shove you
in, governor, she says. She did swear at you, governor! It's a game to
hear her."

"When you learn better, Billy," said Jack, quite sternly, "you won't
talk like that of your mother."

Billy's face overclouded suddenly. He looked first at me, then at Jack,
and finally at the boot in his hand, which he fell-to polishing till it
dazzled. But Jack's tone and look had effectually damped his spirits,
and when he spoke again it was with a half whine.

"I _are_ a larning better, governor, do you hear? I knows my letters.
You ask this 'ere bloke," pointing to me with his brush. "And them
Aggers, too. I writ 'em all up on my slate, didn't I? You tell the
governor if I didn't!"

"Yes," I said; "you did."

"There you are! Do you hear, governor? I'm larnin' better. I writ all
them there Aggers, I did; and I can say my d-o-g, dorg, proper, can't I,
pal? And I've shove my coppers in the bang, and I am larnin'."

"I know you are," said Jack, kindly. "Come, it's time I got on my
boots. Are they done?"

Billy in the delight of