"There's seven an' six owin' me." "Yes," I laughed, "and it would be the last I'd see of you." "Lord lumme, but it'll be the last I see of you if yer don't py me," he retorted.
But a crowd of ragged onlookers had already gathered around the cab, and I laughed again and walked back to the old-clothes shop.
Here the chief difficulty was in making the shopman understand that I really and truly wanted old clothes.

But after fruitless attempts to press upon me new and impossible coats and trousers, he began to bring to light heaps of old ones, looking mysterious the while and hinting darkly.
This he did with the palpable intention of letting me know that he had "piped my lay," in order to bulldose me, through fear of exposure, into paying heavily for my purchases.

A man in trouble, or a high-class criminal from across the water, was what he took my measure for--in either case, a person anxious to avoid the police.
But I disputed with him over the outrageous difference between prices and values, till I quite disabused him of the notion, and he settled down to drive a hard bargain with a hard customer.

In the end I selected a pair of stout though well-worn trousers, a frayed jacket with one remaining button, a pair of brogans which had plainly seen service where coal was shovelled, a thin leather belt, and a very dirty cloth cap.

My underclothing and socks, however, were new and warm, but of the sort that any American waif, down in his luck, could acquire in the ordinary course of events.
"I must sy yer a sharp 'un," he said, with counterfeit admiration, as I handed over the ten shillings finally agreed upon for the outfit.
"Blimey, if you ain't ben up an' down Petticut Lane afore now.