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Mother Mawks, who had been testing the coins Liz had given her by biting them ferociously with her large yellow teeth, broke into a loud laugh.

“Take it with yer! I like that! Wot imperence! Take it with yer!” Then, with her huge red arms akimbo, she added, with a grin, “Tell yer wot, if yer likes to pay me ‘arf a crown, yer can ‘ave it to cuddle, an’ welcome!”

Another shout of approving merriment burst from the drink-sodden spectators of the little scene, and the girl crouched on the ground removed her encircling hands from her knees to clap them loudly, as she exclaimed:

“Well done, Mother Mawks! One doesn’t let out kids at night for nothing! ‘T ought to be more expensive than daytime!”

The face of Liz had grown white and rigid.

“You know I can’t give you that money,” she said, slowly. “I have not tasted bit or drop all day. I must live, though it doesn’t seem worth while. The child”–and her voice softened involuntarily–“is fast asleep; it’s a pity to wake it, that’s all. It will cry and fret all night, and–and I will make it warm and comfortable if you’d let me.” She raised her eyes hopefully and anxiously. “Will you?”

Mother Mawks was evidently a lady of an excitable disposition. The simple request seemed to drive her nearly frantic. She raised her voice to an absolute scream, thrusting her dirty hands through her still dirtier hair as the proper accompanying gesture to her vituperative oratory.

“Will I! Will I!” she screeched. “Will I let out my hown babby for the night for nuthin’? Will I? No, I won’t! I’ll see yer blowed into the middle of next week fust! Lor’ ‘a’ mussey! ‘ow ‘igh an’ mighty we are gittin’, to be sure! The babby’ll be quiet with you, Miss Liz, will it, hindeed! An’ it will cry an’ fret with its hown mother, will it, hindeed!” And at every sentence she approached Liz more nearly, increasing in fury as she advanced. “Yer low hussy! D’ye think I’d let ye ‘ave my babby for a hour unless yer paid for ‘it? As it is, yer pays far too little. I’m an honest woman as works for my livin’ an’ wot drinks reasonable, better than you by a long sight, with yer stuck-up airs! A pretty drab you are! Gi’ me the babby; ye ‘a’n’t no business to keep it a minit longer.” And she made a grab at Liz’s sheltering shawl.

“Oh, don’t hurt it!” pleaded Liz, tremblingly. “Such a little thing–don’t hurt it!”

Mother Mawks stared so wildly that her blood-shot eyes seemed protruding from her head.

“‘Urt it! Hain’t I a right to do wot I likes with my hown babby? ‘Urt it! Well, I never! Look ‘ere!”–and she turned round on the assembled neighbours–“hain’t she a reg’lar one? She don’t care for the law, not she! She’s keepin’ back a child from its hown mother!” And with that she made a fierce attack on the shawl, and succeeded in dragging the infant from Liz’s reluctant arms. Wakened thus roughly from its slumbers, the poor mite set up a feeble wailing; its mother, enraged at the sound, shook it violently till it gasped for breath.

“Drat the little beast!” she cried. “Why don’t it choke an’ ‘ave done with it!”

And, without heeding the terrified remonstrances of Liz, she flung the child roughly, as though it were a ball, through the open door of her lodgings, where it fell on a heap of dirty clothes, and lay motionless; its wailing had ceased.

“Oh, baby, baby!” exclaimed Liz, in accents of poignant distress. “Oh, you have killed it, I am sure! Oh, you are cruel, cruel! Oh, baby, baby!”

And she broke into a tempestuous passion of sobs and tears. The bystanders looked on in unmoved silence. Mother Mawks gathered her torn garments round her with a gesture of defiance, and sniffed the air as though she said, “Any one who wants to meddle with me will get the worst of it.” There was a brief pause; suddenly a man staggered out of the gin-shop, smearing the back of his hand across his mouth as he came–a massively built, ill-favoured brute, with a shock of uncombed red hair and small ferret-like eyes. He stared stupidly at the weeping Liz, then at Mother Mawks, finally from one to the other of the loafers who stood by. “Wot’s the row?” he demanded, quickly. “Wot’s up? ‘Ave it out fair! Joe Mawks ‘ll stand by and see fair game. Fire away, my hearties! fire, fire away!” And, with a chuckling idiot laugh, he dived into the pocket of his torn corduroy trousers and produced a pipe. Filling this leisurely from a greasy pouch, with such unsteady fingers that the tobacco dropped all over him, he lighted it, repeating, with increased thickness of utterance, “Wot’s the row! ‘Ave it out fair!”