But Mr. Sandboys being wholly unaccustomed to hints of such a nature, hurried quickly past the obsequious functionary, and telling his bewildered Aggy that some other misunderstanding had occurred, though what it was, and what it referred to, was more than he could make out just then, seized his hat, and without waiting to listen to her remonstrances, suddenly left the house in company with the parochial officer. On reaching the workhouse, the mystery concerning which the bewildered Cursty had been puzzling his brains for the last hour, was quickly explained. The Flower Hawker, who had become possessed of Mr. Sandboys’ inexpressibles, had retired into the country on the “tramp,” leaving his “pardner” behind to take up her abode in the workhouse until his return. On entering that establishment, however, and undergoing the change of dress customary on such occasions, the “marriage lines” belonging to Mr. and Mrs. Sandboys, which the woman had appropriated (owing to the total absence of any similar document appertaining to herself) were discovered secreted in her bosom, and the name Christopher Sandboys being recognised by the authorities as that of the pickpocket who had been arrested at the Crystal Palace, the parish officers had made it their business to track out the whereabouts of the said Christopher; and learning at the police-office that he had recently been discharged from custody, and had afterwards retired in company with his witness, a gentleman from Craven-street in the Strand, they had directed their constable to bring “the man” before them, so that he might be made responsible for the maintenance of his wife. Mr. Sandboys had no little difficulty in making “the Board” comprehend and believe the facts of the case; for though the woman denied that he was her husband, as stoutly as Cursty did that she was his wife, the ever suspicious authorities could not help fancying but what there was some trick in the affair, and that the woman persisted in her statement of having picked up the paper in the street, merely from a desire to keep “her pardner” out of trouble, so that it was not until Mr. Sandboys had sent for Major Oldschool to speak once more to his respectability, that he was allowed to return to the bosom of his family.