Page:A Child of the Jago - Arthur Morrison.djvu/145

 also of these resplendent ones. It was of these that old Beveridge had spoken one day to Dicky, in language the child but half understood. The old man sat on a kerb in view of the Bag of Nails and smoked a blackened bit of clay pipe. He hauled Dicky to his side, and, pointing with his pipe, said:—"See that man with the furs?"

"What?" Dicky replied. "Mean 'im in the ice-cream coat, smokin' a cigar? Yus."

"And the other, with the brimmy tall-hat, and the red face, and the umbrella?"

"Yus."

"What are they?"

"'Igh mob. 'Ooks. Toffs."

"Right. Now, Dicky Perrott, you Jago whelp, look at them—look hard. Some day, if you're clever—cleverer than anyone in the Jago now—if you're only scoundrel enough, and brazen enough, and lucky enough—one of a