He's done
for. He's killed. The first time I ever see that boy,' said Poll, 'I
charged him too much for a red-poll. I asked him three-halfpence for a
penny one, because I was afraid he'd beat me down. But he didn't.
And now he's dead; and if you was to crowd all the steam-engines and
electric fluids that ever was, into this shop, and set 'em every one to
work their hardest, they couldn't square the account, though it's only a
ha'penny!'
Mr Sweedlepipe turned aside to the towel, and wiped his eyes with it.
'And what a clever boy he was!' he said. 'What a surprising young chap
he was! How he talked! and what a deal he know'd! Shaved in this very
chair he was; only for fun; it was all his fun; he was full of it. Ah!
to think that he'll never be shaved in earnest! The birds might every
one have died, and welcome,' cried the little barber, looking round him
at the cages, and again applying to the towel, 'sooner than I'd have
heard this news!'
'How did you ever come to hear it?' said Mrs Gamp, 'who told you?'
'I went out,' returned the little barber, 'into the City, to meet a
sporting gent upon the Stock Exchange, that wanted a few slow pigeons to
practice at; and when I'd done with him, I went to get a little drop
of beer, and there I heard everybody a-talking about it.
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