son of a pepper-castor! Who let you out o' the cruet-stand?
Wot d'ee mean by raisin' yer dirty foot ag'in a _honest_ man, w'ch _you_
ain't, an' never was, an' never will be, an' never _could_ be, seein'
that both your respected parients was 'anged afore you was born. Come
on, I say. You ain't a coward, air you? If so, I'll 'and you over to
Little Jim 'ere, an' stand by to see fair play!"

During this outburst, Mr Sparks had quietly faced the excited boy,
watching his opportunity to make a dash at him, but the appearance of a
policeman put a sudden termination to the riot by inducing the Bloater
and Little Jim to shoulder their brooms and fly. Mr Sparks, smiling
grimly, (he never smiled otherwise), thrust his hands into his pockets,
resumed his cheroot, and held on the even tenor of his way.

But he had not yet done with the Bloater. That volatile and revengeful
youth, having run on in advance, ensconced himself behind a projection
at the corner of the street close to which Sparks had to pass, and from
that point of vantage suddenly shot into his ear a yell so excruciating
that it caused the man to start and stagger off the pavement; before he
could recover himself, his tormentor had doubled round the corner and
vanished.

Growling savagely, he continued his walk. One of the turns to the left,
which he had to make, led him through a dark and narrow street. Here,
keeping carefully in the middle of the road for security, he looked
sharply on either side, having his hands out of his pockets now, and
clenched, for he fully expected another yell. He was wrong, however, in
his expectations. The Bloater happened to know of a long ladder, whose
nightly place of repose was on the ground in a certain dark passage,
with its end pointing across that street. Taking up a position beside
this ladder, with Little Jim--who followed him, almost bursting with
delight--he bided his time and kept as quiet as a mouse. Just in the
nick of time the ladder was run out, and Mr Sparks tripping over it,
fell violently to the ground. He sprang up and gave chase, of course,
but he might as well have followed a will-o'-the-wisp. The young
scamps, doubling like hares, took refuge in a dark recess under a stair
with which they were well acquainted, and from that position they
watched their enemy. They heard him go growling past; knew, a moment or
two later, from the disappointed tone of the growl, that he had found
the opening at the ot