afe to go after me poor shoes
and could I git thim on if I did, me feet bein' swelled surprisin'.
Sure, the little spalpeen owed me ivrything he had about him!

"All to wanct a grand idea come to me. I would kidnap me little
gintleman and hold him for wan of thim ransoms! 'Sure,' I says to
mesilf, 'they're kidnappin' boys all the time, and it's the tidy sum a
grown man would be bringin' me, though it's the little wan he is and
part wore out.'

"'I say, sor,' I calls up to him, polite, from behind me wall, and
droppin' a whole brick closer to him than common, 'wouldn't it be
after bein' more pleasant for ye to come down willin',' I says, 'than
to have wan of thim bricks search the head of ye for brains and turn
the corpse over to me? To say nothin' of the mosquities,' I says.

"'They niver bite me,' he says, trembly-like, from behind his bit of a
wall.

"'Holy Saints,' I says, 'that's queer! Are ye as bad as that?'

"'What do ye want of me annyways?' says he, still trembly.

"'Well,' I says, ''twas me intention to rob ye, but now--' And thin I
stopped to listen to him keepin' quiet and worryin'. 'But now,' says I
prisintly, 'I'm goin' to kidnap ye and inform your friends ye'll be
killed entirely if they don't sind me five thousand dollars
immediate.'

"'Oh!' says he, like I'd said I was goin' to give him something he
wanted. 'Oh,' says he, 'I'll be right down. Just wait till I find me
hat.'

"Och, it took me breath away to have him so willin', but I could hear
him scramblin' round up there, and prisintly I seen him at a hole in
the wall, and he begun lettin' down his ladder and losin' no time over
it.

"'I'll just be takin' anny sticks of things ye have,' I says, frindly,
whin he come down to me, and, findin' the flat side of two bricks for
me poor feet, I wint through him careful and religious. So help me,
they was only elivin dollars and twinty cents and niver the sign of a
watch! He might as well been some wan that earned his own livin'.

"'Look here,' says he, maybe feelin' sort of hurt himsilf, 'ye said
five thousand. Why not make it ten?'

"'What?' says I, gaspin'.

"'Why not make it ten?' says he.

"'Arrah,' says I, 'are ye wantin' me to feed ye till me grandchilder
can be collectin' of it? Ten thousand, indeed! Ye ought to be thankful
ye ain't marked down to forty-nine-fifty.'

"'Oh, well,' he says, careless, 'it's none of my business. But where
do ye take me?'

"Now I'd been thinkin' of a ol