"I wos wonst over in New York. That's a good many years ago. _That_ was a long time ago. Yes, a very long time ago, in Bob Bowyer's time, when Bob was the topper, as we say. He wos the 'Awkshaw of the period, wos Bob. I wos awfully innocent then, and Bob didn't take the right care of me, and I fell into the hands of the Philistines. I went down one day to Fulton Market; I think it's just opposite some ferry where you go across, just like Southwark, and you can get very big oysters there. Well, as I wos saying, I wos werry innocent, and as I wos walking along, thinking of a good many things, when one of these fellows I believe you call the gentry on your side 'heelers'--dropped a big fat pocket-book at my feet. "Now, mind you, I did not see him drop it, and that's where I was taken in. That made the trouble for me. I had never seen anything of that kind done in England, and of course the 'heeler' naturally insisted that the pocket-book wos mine. I tried to argue with him that the pocket-book wos not mine, but the more I argued that way the more he persewered the other way. Well, I wos perswaded against my own ideas that, perhaps, I might have lost a pocket-book, and the fellow wos so blessed positive about it too. So I fell a wictim to the infernal scoundrel, and gave him some money for the pocket-book, and, of course, the money wos worth nothink, and Bob Bowyer could do nothing for me. Ah, New York is a precious bad place.--So it is." [Illustration: THE POCKET-BOOK GAME.] "Well, now, Mr. Funnell, as you have done relating your sad experiences, you will please do as I tell you. You will report to our American friend, or, rather, he will report to you early in the morning, and you will take him and show him Billingsgate Market before daybreak. You are the best man for Billingsgate, I think, and you had better attend to that detail." [Sidenote: "PIPING OFF."] "I will meet him there or at the Fish Hill monument, at 5 o'clock in the morning, if that will do, Sir." "That will do very well," said the Inspector. "And now we want a man for Smithfield. Who is a good man for Smithfield? Let me see," and the Inspector tapped his forehead. "I think Ralfe will do for that. He knows the Smithfield Market best, and he will show you everything, with a knowledge of what he is doing. Let Ralfe come up, and Sergeant Scott and Webb. I want to speak to them." Ralfe, or Dick Ralfe, as he was called, was a good-looking young Englishman, who had not been long on the force, and who was in capital health and spirits, having lately been detailed, for his quickness, to special duty from the patrol to the Old Jewry.