CHAPTER I--HOW MRS.
LIRRIPER CARRIED ON THE
BUSINESS
Whoever would begin to be worried with letting Lodgings that wasn\'t
a lone woman with a living to get is a thing inconceivable to me, my dear;
excuse the familiarity, but it comes natural to me in my own little room,
when wishing to open my mind to those that I can trust, and I should be
truly thankful if they were all mankind, but such is not so, for have but a
Furnished bill in the window and your watch on the mantelpiece, and
farewell to it if you turn your back for but a second, however gentlemanly
the manners; nor is being of your own sex any safeguard, as I have reason,
in the form of sugar-tongs to know, for that lady (and a fine woman she
was) got me to run for a glass of water, on the plea of going to be confined,
which certainly turned out true, but it was in the Station-house.
Number Eighty-one Norfolk Street, Strand--situated midway between
the City and St. James\'s, and within five minutes\' walk of the principal
places of public amusement--is my address. I have rented this house
many years, as the parish rate-books will testify; and I could wish my
landlord was as alive to the fact as I am myself; but no, bless you, not a
half a pound of paint to save his life, nor so much, my dear, as a tile upon
the roof, though on your bended knees.