“There’s the gal now!” said granny, in excitement.
“Where?” said her companion, sharing her excitement.
“Yes. Don’t say a word, and I’ll creep up and get hold of her.”
Tom was about to put back her money in her pocket, when she felt her arm seized in a firm grasp. Turning in startled surprise, she met the triumphant glance of her old granny.
“Let me alone!” said Tom, fiercely, trying to snatch away her arm.
“I’ve got you, have I?” said granny. “I knowed I’d get hold of you at last, you young trollop! Come home with me, right off!”
“I won’t go with you,” said Tom, resolutely. “I don’t want to have anything to do with you. You haven’t got anything to do with me.”
“Haven’t I, I should like to know? Aint I your granny?”
“What do you mean by that?” demanded Mrs. Walsh, rather taken aback.
“You aint any relation of mine. I don’t know where you got hold of me; but I won’t own such an old drunkard for a granny.”
“Come along!” said granny, fiercely. “You’ll pay for this, miss.”
“Help!” exclaimed Tom, finding that she was likely to be carried away against her will, at the same time struggling violently.
“What’s the matter?” asked a gentleman, who had just come out of the restaurant.
“It’s my grand-child, sir,” said Mrs. Walsh, obsequiously. “She run away from me, and now she don’t want to go back.”
“She hasn’t got anything to do with me,” said Tom. “Help!”
This last exclamation was intended to attract the attention of a policeman who was approaching.
“What’s the trouble?” he demanded, authoritatively.
“What is the child’s name?” asked the policeman.
“Jane,” answered the old woman, who was at first on the point of saying “Tom.”
“Ever since she was born, till a few weeks ago.”
“What do you say to this?” asked the officer.
“I did live with her; but she beat me, so I left her. She says she is my granny, but she isn’t.”
This intelligence rather astonished granny, who heard it for the first time.
“Is the child related to you?” asked the officer.
“She’s my grandchild, but she’s always been a wild, troublesome child. Many’s the time I have kept awake all night thinkin’ of her bad ways,” said granny, virtuously. “It was only yesterday,” she added, with a sudden thought suggested by the sight of the money which she had seen Tom counting, “that she came to my room, and stole some money. She’s got it in her pocket now.”