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Page 14
It was in Skulpit's room that the petition was now lying, waiting such
additional signatures as Abel Handy, by his eloquence, could obtain
for it. The six marks it bore were duly attested, thus:
his his his
Abel X Handy, Gregy X Moody, Mathew X Spriggs,
mark mark mark
&c., and places were duly designated in pencil for those brethren who
were now expected to join: for Skulpit alone was left a spot on which
his genuine signature might be written in fair clerk-like style.
Handy had brought in the document, and spread it out on the small deal
table, and was now standing by it persuasive and eager. Moody had
followed with an inkhorn, carefully left behind by Finney; and Spriggs
bore aloft, as though it were a sword, a well-worn ink-black pen,
which from time to time he endeavoured to thrust into Skulpit's
unwilling hand.
With the learned man were his two abettors in indecision, William Gazy
and Jonathan Crumple. If ever the petition were to be forwarded, now
was the time,--so said Mr Finney; and great was the anxiety on the
part of those whose one hundred pounds a year, as they believed,
mainly depended on the document in question.
"To be kept out of all that money," as the avaricious Moody had
muttered to his friend Handy, "by an old fool saying that he can
write his own name like his betters!"
"Well, Job," said Handy, trying to impart to his own sour,
ill-omened visage a smile of approbation, in which he greatly
failed; "so you're ready now, Mr Finney says; here's the
place, d'ye see;"--and he put his huge brown finger down on
the dirty paper;--"name or mark, it's all one. Come along,
old boy; if so be we're to have the spending of this money,
why the sooner the better,--that's my maxim."
"To be sure," said Moody. "We a'n't none of us so young; we can't
stay waiting for old Catgut no longer."
It was thus these miscreants named our excellent friend. The nickname
he could easily have forgiven, but the allusion to the divine source
of all his melodious joy would have irritated even him. Let us hope
he never knew the insult.
"Only think, old Billy Gazy," said Spriggs, who rejoiced in greater
youth than his brethren, but having fallen into a fire when drunk, had
had one eye burnt out, one cheek burnt through, and one arm nearly
burnt off, and who, therefore, in regard to personal appearance, was
not the most prepossessing of men, "a hundred a year, and all to
spend; only think, old Billy Gazy;" and he gave a hideous grin that
showed off his misfortunes to their full extent.
Old Billy Gazy was not alive to much enthusiasm. Even these golden
prospects did not arouse him to do more than rub his poor old bleared
eyes with the cuff of his bedesman's gown, and gently mutter: "he
didn't know, not he; he didn't know."
"But you'd know, Jonathan," continued Spriggs, turning to the other
friend of Skulpit's, who was sitting on a stool by the table, gazing
vacantly at the petition. Jonathan Crumple was a meek, mild man, who
had known better days; his means had been wasted by bad children,
who had made his life wretched till he had been received into the
hospital, of which he had not long been a member. Since that day he
had known neither sorrow nor trouble, and this attempt to fill him
with new hopes was, indeed, a cruelty.
"A hundred a year's a nice thing, for sartain, neighbour Spriggs,"
said he. "I once had nigh to that myself, but it didn't do me no
good." And he gave a low sigh, as he thought of the children of his
own loins who had robbed him.
"And shall have again, Joe," said Handy; "and will have someone to
keep it right and tight for you this time."
Crumple sighed again;--he had learned the impotency of worldly wealth,
and would have been satisfied, if left untempted, to have remained
happy with one and sixpence a day.
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