Читать книгу Charles Peace, or The Adventures of a Notorious Burglar онлайн

337 страница из 895

“‘I don’t like the job,’ I exclaimed, ‘that I tell you plainly—​I don’t like it at all.’

“‘That may be, but you’ll do it—​you must!’

“‘When am I to touch?’ said I.

“‘Immediately after the race comes off. Our people are honourable, and just in all their dealings.’”

“Oh, oh!” exclaimed half a dozen of the prisoners, simultaneously.

“In a manner of speaking,” returned the gipsy. “That’s what Jim wished me to understand. He said he would take their word for thousands.

“Well, I took the balls—​the colt and filly ran like cows, and I got the coin.

“Three times afterwards I did the physicking game while in my employer’s service. I believe he suspected something, and discharged one man after another, till it came to my turn, and I was sent adrift without a character.

“‘And serve you right, too,’ said Peace. ‘What else could you expect?’

“I had no right to expect anything else, and if I had I should have been disappointed. I was now like a fettered dog, obliged to crouch before the glance of my keeper. Jim had only to say do this or do that, and I was forced to obey.