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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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965 Newman Noggs uttered his name, and Mr Lillyvick groaned: then coughed to hide it. But the groan was a full-sized groan, and the cough was but a wheeze. ‘Is anything the matter?’ said Newman Noggs. ‘Matter, sir!’ cried Mr Lillyvick. ‘The plug of life is dry, sir, and but the mud is left.’ This speech--the style of which Newman attributed to Mr Lillyvick’s recent association with theatrical characters--not being quite explanatory, Newman looked as if he were about to ask another question, when Mr Lillyvick prevented him by shaking his hand mournfully, and then waving his own. ‘Let me be shaved!’ said Mr Lillyvick. ‘It shall be done before Morleena; it is Morleena, isn’t it?’ ‘Yes,’ said Newman. ‘Kenwigses have got a boy, haven’t they?’ inquired the collector. Again Newman said ‘Yes.’ ‘Is it a nice boy?’ demanded the collector. ‘It ain’t a very nasty one,’ returned Newman, rather embarrassed by the question. ‘Susan Kenwigs used to say,’ observed the collector, ‘that if ever she had another boy, she hoped it might be like me. Is this one like me, Mr Noggs?’ This was a puzzling inquiry; but Newman evaded it, by replying to Mr Lillyvick, that he thought the baby might possibly come like him in time. ‘I should be glad to have somebody like me, somehow,’ said Mr Lillyvick, ‘before I die.’ ‘You don’t mean to do that, yet awhile?’ said Newman. |
