At the end of this he turned to the right again, past the front and nearly to the bottom of the street, when he turned to the left and followed a wide street till it became suddenly narrow, and instead of being full of people it was quite empty.
Here he darted into a covered way with columns all along the side, running very fast still, and I suppose I was too, and gradually overtaking him, but he reached the end of the street before I could come up with him, and as he turned the corner I felt quite despairing once more at seeing him pass out of sight.
It was only a matter of moments before I too turned the corner, and found myself in the dirtiest busiest street I had ever seen, with unpleasant-looking people about, and throngs of children playing over the foul pavement and in the road.
My boy seemed quite at home there and as if he belonged to the place.

I noticed that as I ran after him, wondering whether it would be of any use to call to them to stop him, though if I had determined that it would be I had not the breath, as I panted on at a much slower rate now, and with the perspiration streaming down my face.
I kept losing sight of him, there were so many people grouped about the pavement along which he ran, while I kept to the road, but he went in and out among them as easily as a dog might have run, till all at once I saw him dive in amongst a number of men talking at the entrance of a narrow archway with a public-house on one side, and as I ran up I found that it was a court, down which I caught a glimpse of the boy with the rope still over his arm.
I stopped for nothing but dashed in after him, the men giving way at first, but as I blundered in my haste against one rough-looking fellow, he roared out savagely: "Now, then, where are you running to ?" and made a snatch at my collar.
I eluded him by making quite a bound in my alarm, and nearly falling over the leg of another, who thrust it out to trip me up.

I escaped a fall, however, and entered the court, which seemed to be half full of children, just in time to see my boy slip into a house nearly at the bottom, on the left.
He stopped for a moment to look back to see if I was coming, and then he disappeared, and my heart gave a bound, for in my excitement I felt that I had succeeded, and that I had traced the young thief to his lair.
I did not think about anything else, only that the children all stopped their games and set up a kind of yell, while it seemed to me that the men who were at the entrance of the court were all following me slowly with their hands thrust down low in their pockets, and it struck me for the moment that they were all coming down to see the capture of the thief.
I was in happy ignorance just then that I had followed the boy into one of the vilest and most dangerous parts of London in those days,--to wit a Drury Lane court, one of the refuges of some of the worst characters in that district.
In this ignorance I was still observant, and noticed that the doors on each side of the dirty court stood wide open, while the yell set up by the children brought people to some of the open windows.
That was all seen in a glance, as I made for the open door at the end, before which a boy of my own size ran as if to stop me; but even if I had wished to stop just then I could not, and I gave him a sharp push, the weight of my body driving him back into a sitting position as I stumbled in from the pavement, up a couple of stone steps, and on to the boards of the narrow passage, which seemed, by contrast to the bright sunshine outside, quite dark.
I did not stop, but went on as if by instinct to the end, passed a flight of steps leading down to the cellar kitchen, up which came a noisome odour that turned me sick, and began to ascend the stairs before me.
Then I paused for a moment with my hand on a sticky balustrade and listened.
Yes! I was quite right, for up above me I could hear the stairs creaking as if some one was going up; and to make me the more sure that the boy had not entered a room I could hear his hoarse panting, accompanied by a faint whimpering cry, as if every moment or two he kept saying softly, "Oh!" That satisfied me, and as fast as I could I went up one flight and then another of dirty creaking stairs and found myself on the first floor.
Then up another flight, dirtier, more creaking, and with the woodwork broken away here and there.
Up another flight worse still, and by the light of a staircase window I could see that the plaster ceiling was down here and there, showing the laths, while the wall was blackened by hands passing over it.

On the handrail side the balusters were broken out entirely in the most dangerous way; but all this seemed of no consequence whatever, for there was the boy still going on, evidently to the very top of the house.
All at once there was silence above me, and I thought he must have gone, but he was only listening, and as he heard me coming he uttered a faint cry, and went on up whimpering, evidently so much exhausted by the long chase that he could hardly drag himself up higher.
By this time I was up to the second floor, where there were a couple of battered doors and another staircase window nearly without glass, the broken panes being covered with paper pasted on, or else, fortunately for the inhabitants of the noisome place, left open for the air to blow through.
I ought to have stopped; in fact I ought never to have gone; but I was too much excited by my chase to think of anything but getting hold of that boy and shaking him till he dropped our new rope; and now as I began to toil breathlessly up the last flight I knew that my task was done, for my young enemy could hardly crawl, and had begun to sob and whine, and I could just make out: "You'd best let me be--I--I--ain't--I ain't done--done--" I heard no more, only that doors were being thrown open, and there was a buzz of voices below, with heavy footsteps in the passage.
Still that did not seem to have anything to do with me, so intent was I on my pursuit up those last two flights of stairs, which seemed to be steeper, more broken, and more difficult to climb than those which had gone before.

In fact the boy above me was dragging himself up, and I had settled down into a walk, helping myself on by the dirty hand-rail, and panting so hoarsely that each breath came to be a snore.