"It's very odd," said Travers, reflectively, as the dog recovered his proper level, "but I always thought that it was half the right ear that Bingo had lost."

"So it is, isn't it?" said the colonel. "Left, eh? Well, I thought myself it was the right."

My heart almost stopped with terror; I had altogether forgotten that. I hastened to set the point at rest. "Oh, it was the left," I said, positively; "I know it because I remember so particularly thinking how odd it was that it should be the left ear, and not the right!" I told myself this should be positively my last lie.

"Why odd?" asked Frank Travers, with his most offensive Socratic manner.

"My dear fellow, I can't tell you," I said, impatiently; "everything seems odd when you come to think at all about it."

"Algernon," said Lilian, later on, "will you tell Aunt Mary and Mr. Travers and—me how it was you came to find Bingo? Mr. Travers is quite anxious to hear all about it."

I could not very well refuse; I sat down and told the story, all my own way. I painted Blagg perhaps rather bigger and blacker than life, and described an exciting scene, in which I recognised Bingo by his collar in the streets, and claimed and bore him off then and there in spite of all opposition.

I had the inexpressible pleasure of seeing Travers grinding his teeth with envy as I went on, and feeling Lilian's soft, slender hand glide silently into mine as I told my tale in the twilight.

All at once, just as I reached the climax, we heard the poodle barking furiously at the hedge which separated my garden from the road.

"There's a foreign-looking man staring over the hedge," said Lilian; "Bingo always did hate foreigners."

There certainly was a swarthy man there, and, though I had no reason for it then, somehow my heart died within me at the sight of him.

"Don't be alarmed, sir," cried the colonel; "the dog won't bite you—unless there's a hole in the hedge anywhere."

The stranger took off his small straw hat with a sweep. "Ah, I am not afraid," he said, and his accent proclaimed him a Frenchman; "he is not enrage at me. May I ask, it is pairmeet to speak viz Misterre Vezzered?"

I felt I must deal with this person alone, for I feared the worst; and, asking them to excuse me, I went to the hedge and faced the Frenchman with the frightful calm of despair. He was a short, stout little man, with blue cheeks, sparkling black eyes, and a vivacious walnut-coloured countenance; he wore a short black alpaca coat, and a large white cravat, with an immense oval malachite brooch in the centre of it, which I mention because I found myself staring mechanically at it during the interview.

"My name is Weatherhead," I began with the bearing of a detected pickpocket. "Can I be of any service to you?"

"Of a great service," he said, emphatically; "you can restore to me ze poodle vich I see zere!"

Nemesis had called at last in the shape of a rival claimant. I staggered for an instant; then I said, "Oh, I think you are under a mistake; that dog is not mine."

"I know it," he said; "zere 'as been leetle mistake, so if ze dog is not to you, you give him back to me, hein?"

"I tell you," I said, "that poodle belongs to the gentleman over there." And I pointed to the colonel, seeing that it was best now to bring him into the affair without delay.

"You are wrong," he said, doggedly; "ze poodle is my poodle! And I was direct to you—it is your name on ze carte!" And he presented me with that fatal card which I had been foolish enough to give to Blagg as a proof of my identity. I saw it all now; the old villain had betrayed me, and to earn a double reward had put the real owner on my track.

I decided to call the colonel at once, and attempt to brazen it out with the help of his sincere belief in the dog.

"Eh, what's that; what's it all about?" said the colonel, bustling up, followed at intervals by the others.

The Frenchman raised his hat again. "I do not vant to make a trouble," he began, "but zere is leetle mistake. My word of honour, sare, I see my own poodle in your garden. Ven I appeal to zis gentilman to restore 'im he reffer me to you."

"You must allow me to know my own dog, sir," said the colonel. "Why, I've had him from a pup. Bingo, old boy, you know your name, don't you?"

But the brute ignored him altogether, and began to leap wildly at the hedge in frantic efforts to join the Frenchman. It needed no Solomon to decide his ownership!

"I tell you, you 'ave got ze wrong poodle—it is my own dog, my Azor! He remember me well, you see? I lose him, it is three, four days. . . . I see a nottice zat he is found, and ven I go to ze address zey tell me, 'Oh, he is reclaim, he is gone viz a strangaire who has advertise.' Zey show me ze placard; I follow 'ere, and ven I arrive I see my poodle in ze garden before me!"

"But look here," said the colonel, impatiently; "it's all very well to say that, but how can you prove it? I give you my word that the dog belongs to me! You must prove your claim, eh, Travers?"

"Yes," said Travers, judicially; "mere assertion is no proof; it's oath against oath at present."

"Attend an instant; your poodle, was he 'ighly train, had he some talents—a dog viz tricks, eh?"

"No, he's not," said the colonel; "I don't like to see dogs taught to play the fool; there's none of that nonsense about him, sir!"

"Ah, remark him well, then. Azor, mon chou, danse donc un peu!"

And, on the foreigner's whistling a lively air, that infernal poodle rose on his hind legs and danced solemnly about half-way round the garden! We inside followed his movements with dismay.

"Why, dash it all!" cried the disgusted colonel, "he's dancing along like a d—d mountebank! But it's my Bingo, for all that!"

"You are not convince? You shall see more. Azor, ici! Pour Beesmarck, Azor!" (the poodle barked ferociously.) "Pour Gambetta!" (He wagged his tail and began to leap with joy.) "Meurs pour la patrie!" And the too accomplished animal rolled over as if killed in battle!

"Where could Bingo have picked up so much French?" cried Lilian, incredulously.

"Or so much French history?" added that serpent, Travers.

"Shall I command 'im to jump, or reverse 'imself?" inquired the obliging Frenchman.

"We've seen that, thank you," said the colonel, gloomily. "Upon my word, I don't know what to think. It can't be that that's not my Bingo after all—I'll never believe it!"

I tried a last desperate stroke. "Will you come round to the front?" I said to the Frenchman. "I'll let you in, and we can discuss the matter quietly." Then, as we walked back together, I asked him eagerly what he would take to abandon his claims and let the colonel think the poodle was his after all.

He was furious—he considered himself insulted; with great emotion he informed me that the dog was the pride of his life (it seems to be the mission of black poodles to serve as domestic comforts of this priceless kind!), that he would not part with him for twice his weight in gold.

"Figure," he began, as we joined the others, "zat zis gentilman 'ere 'as offer me money for ze dog! He agrees zat it is to me, you see? Ver' well, zen, zere is no more to be said!"

"Why, Weatherhead, have you lost faith too, then?" said the colonel.

I saw it was no good; all I wanted now was to get out of it creditably and get rid of the Frenchman. "I'm sorry to say," I replied, "that I'm afraid I've been deceived by the extraordinary likeness. I don't think, on reflection, that that is Bingo!"

"What do you think, Travers?" asked the colonel.

"Well, since you ask me," said Travers, with quite unnecessary dryness, "I never did think so."

"Nor I," said the colonel; "I thought from the first that was never my Bingo. Why, Bingo would make two of that beast!"

And Lilian and her aunt both protested that they had had their doubts from the first.

"Zen you pairmeet zat I remove 'im?" said the Frenchman.

"Certainly," said the colonel; and, after some apologies on our part for the mistake, he went off in triumph, with the detestable poodle frisking after him.

When he had gone the colonel laid his hand kindly on my shoulder. "Don't look so cut up about it, my boy," he said; "you did your best—there was a sort of likeness to any one who didn't know Bingo as we did."

Just then the Frenchman again appeared at the hedge. "A thousand pardons," he said, "but I find zis upon my dog; it is not to me. Suffer me to restore it viz many compliments."

It was Bingo's collar. Travers took it from his hand and brought it to us.

"This was on the dog when you stopped that fellow, didn't you say?" he asked me.

One more lie—and I was so weary of falsehood! "Y-yes," I said, reluctantly; "that was so."

"Very extraordinary," said Travers; "that's the wrong poodle beyond a doubt, but when he's found he's wearing the right dog's collar! Now how do you account for that?"

"My good fellow," I said, impatiently, "I'm not in the witness-box. I can't account for it. It-it's a mere coincidence!"

"But look here, my dear Weatherhead," argued Travers (whether in good faith or not I never could quite make out), "don't you see what a tremendously important link it is? Here's a dog who (as I understand the facts) had a silver collar, with his name engraved on it, round his neck at the time he was lost. Here's that identical collar turning up soon afterward round the neck of a totally different dog! We must follow this up; we must get at the bottom of it somehow! With a clue like this, we're sure to find out either the dog himself, or what's become of him! Just try to recollect exactly what happened, there's a good fellow. This is just the sort of thing I like!"

It was the sort of thing I did not enjoy at all. "You must excuse me to-night, Travers," I said, uncomfortably; "you see, just now it's rather a sore subject for me, and I'm not feeling very well!" I was grateful just then for a reassuring glance of pity and confidence from Lilian's sweet eyes, which revived my drooping spirits for the moment.

"Yes, we'll go into it to-morrow, Travers," said the colonel; "and then—hullo, why, there's that confounded Frenchman again!"

It was indeed; he came prancing back delicately, with a malicious enjoyment on his wrinkled face. "Once more I return to apologise," he said. "My poodle 'as permit 'imself ze grave indiscretion to make a very big 'ole at ze bottom of ze garden!"

I assured him that it was of no consequence. "Perhaps," he replied, looking steadily at me through his keen, half-shut eyes, "you vill not say zat ven you regard ze 'ole. And you others, I spik to you: sometimes von loses a somzing vich is qvite near all ze time. It is ver' droll, eh? my vord, ha, ha, ha!" And he ambled off, with an aggressively fiendish laugh that chilled my blood.

"What the deuce did he mean by that, eh?" said the colonel, blankly.

"Don't know," said Travers; "suppose we go and inspect the hole?"

But before that I had contrived to draw near it myself, in deadly fear lest the Frenchman's last words had contained some innuendo which I had not understood.

It was light enough still for me to see something, at the unexpected horror of which I very nearly fainted.

That thrice accursed poodle which I had been insane enough to attempt to foist upon the colonel must, it seems, have buried his supper the night before very near the spot in which I had laid Bingo, and in his attempts to exhume his bone had brought the remains of my victim to the surface!

There the corpse lay, on the very top of the excavations. Time had not, of course, improved its appearance, which was ghastly in the extreme, but still plainly recognisable by the eye of affection.

"It's a very ordinary hole," I gasped, putting myself before it and trying to turn them back. "Nothing in it—nothing at all!"

"Except one Algernon Weatherhead, Esq., eh?" whispered Travers, jocosely, in my ear.

"No; but," persisted the colonel, advancing, "look here! Has the dog damaged any of your shrubs?"

"No, no!" I cried, piteously; "quite the reverse. Let's all go indoors now; it's getting so cold!"

"See, there is a shrub or something uprooted," said the colonel, still coming nearer that fatal hole. "Why, hullo, look there! What's that?"

Lilian, who was by his side, gave a slight scream. "Uncle," she cried, "it looks like—like Bingo!"

The colonel turned suddenly upon me. "Do you hear?" he demanded, in a choked voice. "You hear what she says? Can't you speak out? Is that our Bingo?"

I gave it up at last; I only longed to be allowed to crawl away under something! "Yes," I said in a dull whisper, as I sat down heavily on a garden seat, "yes . . . that's Bingo . . . misfortune . . . shoot him . . . quite an accident!"

There was a terrible explosion after that; they saw at last how I had deceived them, and put the very worst construction upon everything. Even now I writhe impotently at times, and my cheeks smart and tingle with humiliation, as I recall that scene—the colonel's very plain speaking, Lilian's passionate reproaches and contempt, and her aunt's speechless prostration of disappointment.

I made no attempt to defend myself; I was not, perhaps, the complete villain they deemed me, but I felt dully that no doubt it all served me perfectly right.

Still I do not think I am under any obligation to put their remarks down in black and white here.

Travers had vanished at the first opportunity—whether out of delicacy, or the fear of breaking out into unseasonable mirth, I cannot say; and shortly afterward the others came to where I sat silent with bowed head, and bade me a stern and final farewell.

And then, as the last gleam of Lilian's white dress vanished down the garden path, I laid my head down on the table among the coffee-cups, and cried like a beaten child.

I got leave as soon as I could, and went abroad. The morning after my return I noticed, while shaving, that there was a small square marble tablet placed against the wall of the colonel's garden. I got my opera-glass and read—and pleasant reading it was—the following inscription:

IN AFFECTIONATE MEMORY

OF

B I N G O,

SECRETLY AND CRUELLY PUT TO DEATH,

IN COLD BLOOD,

BY A

NEIGHBOUR AND FRIEND.

JUNE, 1881.

If this explanation of mine ever reaches my neighbours' eyes, I humbly hope they will have the humanity either to take away or tone down that tablet. They cannot conceive what I suffer when curious visitors insist, as they do every day, on spelling out the words from our windows, and asking me countless questions about them!

Sometimes I meet the Curries about the village, and as they pass me with averted heads I feel myself growing crimson. Travers is almost always with Lilian now. He has given her a dog,—a fox-terrier,—and they take ostentatiously elaborate precautions to keep it out of my garden.

I should like to assure them here that they need not be under any alarm. I have shot one dog.



THAT BRUTE SIMMONS, By Arthur Morrison

Simmons's infamous behaviour toward his wife is still matter for profound wonderment among the neighbours. The other women had all along regarded him as a model husband, and certainly Mrs. Simmons was a most conscientious wife. She toiled and slaved for that man, as any woman in the whole street would have maintained, far more than any husband had a right to expect. And now this was what she got for it. Perhaps he had suddenly gone mad.

Before she married Simmons, Mrs. Simmons had been the widowed Mrs. Ford. Ford had got a berth as donkeyman on a tramp steamer, and that steamer had gone down with all hands off the Cape: a judgment, the widow woman feared, for long years of contumacy, which had culminated in the wickedness of taking to the sea, and taking to it as a donkeyman—an immeasurable fall for a capable engine-fitter. Twelve years as Mrs. Ford had left her still childless, and childless she remained as Mrs. Simmons.

As for Simmons, he, it was held, was fortunate in that capable wife. He was a moderately good carpenter and joiner, but no man of the world, and he wanted one. Nobody could tell what might not have happened to Tommy Simmons if there had been no Mrs. Simmons to take care of him. He was a meek and quiet man, with a boyish face and sparse, limp whiskers. He had no vices (even his pipe departed him after his marriage), and Mrs. Simmons had ingrafted on him divers exotic virtues. He went solemnly to chapel every Sunday, under a tall hat, and put a penny—one returned to him for the purpose out of his week's wages—in the plate. Then, Mrs. Simmons overseeing, he took off his best clothes, and brushed them with solicitude and pains. On Saturday afternoons he cleaned the knives, the forks, the boots, the kettles, and the windows, patiently and conscientiously; on Tuesday evenings he took the clothes to the mangling; and on Saturday nights he attended Mrs. Simmons in her marketing, to carry the parcels.

Mrs. Simmons's own virtues were native and numerous. She was a wonderful manager. Every penny of Tommy's thirty-six or thirty-eight shillings a week was bestowed to the greatest advantage, and Tommy never ventured to guess how much of it she saved. Her cleanliness in housewifery was distracting to behold. She met Simmons at the front door whenever he came home, and then and there he changed his boots for slippers, balancing himself painfully on alternate feet on the cold flags. This was because she scrubbed the passage and door-step turn about with the wife of the downstairs family, and because the stair-carpet was her own. She vigilantly supervised her husband all through the process of "cleaning himself" after work, so as to come between her walls and the possibility of random splashes; and if, in spite of her diligence, a spot remained to tell the tale, she was at pains to impress the fact on Simmons's memory, and to set forth at length all the circumstances of his ungrateful selfishness. In the beginning she had always escorted him to the ready-made clothes shop, and had selected and paid for his clothes, for the reason that men are such perfect fools, and shopkeepers do as they like with them. But she presently improved on that. She found a man selling cheap remnants at a street-corner, and straightway she conceived the idea of making Simmons's clothes herself. Decision was one of her virtues, and a suit of uproarious check tweeds was begun that afternoon from the pattern furnished by an old one. More: it was finished by Sunday, when Simmons, overcome by astonishment at the feat, was endued in it, and pushed off to chapel ere he could recover his senses. The things were not altogether comfortable, he found: the trousers hung tight against his shins, but hung loose behind his heels; and when he sat, it was on a wilderness of hard folds and seams. Also, his waistcoat collar tickled his nape, but his coat collar went straining across from shoulder to shoulder; while the main garment bagged generously below his waist. Use made a habit of his discomfort, but it never reconciled him to the chaff of his shopmates; for, as Mrs. Simmons elaborated successive suits, each one modelled on the last, the primal accidents of her design developed into principles, and grew even bolder and more hideously pronounced. It was vain for Simmons to hint—as hint he did—that he shouldn't like her to overwork herself, tailoring being bad for the eyes, and there was a new tailor's in the Mile End Road, very cheap, where . . . "Ho yus," she retorted, "you're very consid'rit I dessay sittin' there actin' a livin' lie before your own wife Thomas Simmons as though I couldn't see through you like a book a lot you care about overworkin' me as long as your turn's served throwin' away money like dirt in the street on a lot o' swindlin' tailors an' me workin' and' slavin' 'ere to save a 'a'penny an' this is my return for it any one 'ud think you could pick up money in the 'orse-road an' I b'lieve I'd be thought better of if I laid in bed all day like some would that I do." So that Thomas Simmons avoided the subject, nor even murmured when she resolved to cut his hair.

So his placid fortune endured for years. Then there came a golden summer evening when Mrs. Simmons betook herself with a basket to do some small shopping, and Simmons was left at home. He washed and put away the tea-things, and then he fell to meditating on a new pair of trousers, finished that day, and hanging behind the parlour door. There they hung, in all their decent innocence of shape in the seat, and they were shorter of leg, longer of waist, and wilder of pattern than he had ever worn before. And as he looked on them the small devil of Original Sin awoke and clamoured in his breast. He was ashamed of it, of course, for well he knew the gratitude he owed his wife for those same trousers, among other blessings. Still, there the small devil was, and the small devil was fertile in base suggestions, and could not be kept from hinting at the new crop of workshop gibes that would spring at Tommy's first public appearance in such things.

"Pitch 'em in the dust-bin!" said the small devil at last. "It's all they're fit for."

Simmons turned away in sheer horror of his wicked self, and for a moment thought of washing the tea-things over again by way of discipline. Then he made for the back room, but saw from the landing that the front door was standing open, probably the fault of the child downstairs. Now a front door standing open was a thing that Mrs. Simmons would not abide: it looked low. So Simmons went down, that she might not be wroth with him for the thing when she came back; and, as he shut the door, he looked forth into the street.

A man was loitering on the pavement, and prying curiously about the door. His face was tanned, his hands were deep in the pockets of his unbraced blue trousers, and well back on his head he wore the high-crowned peaked cap, topped with a knob of wool, which is affected by Jack ashore about the docks. He lurched a step nearer to the door, and "Mrs. Ford ain't in, is she?" he said.

Simmons stared at him for a matter of five seconds, and then said, "Eh?"

"Mrs. Ford as was, then—Simmons now, ain't it?"

He said this with a furtive leer that Simmons neither liked nor understood.

"No," said Simmons; "she ain't in now."

"You ain't her 'usband, are ye?"

"Yus."

The man took his pipe from his mouth and grinned silently and long. "Blimy," he said at length, "you look like the sort o' bloke she'd like," and with that he grinned again. Then, seeing that Simmons made ready to shut the door, he put a foot on the sill and a hand against the panel. "Don't be in a 'hurry, matey," he said; "I come 'ere t' 'ave a little talk with you, man to man, d' ye see?" And he frowned fiercely.

Tommy Simmons felt uncomfortable, but the door would not shut, so he parleyed. "Wotjer want?" he asked, "I dunno you."

"Then, if you'll excuse the liberty, I'll interdooce meself, in a manner of speaking." He touched his cap with a bob of mock humility. "I'm Bob Ford," he said, "come back out o' kingdom come so to say. Me as went down with the Mooltan—safe dead five year gone. I come to see my wife."

During this speech Thomas Simmons's jaw was dropping lower and lower. At the end of it he poked his fingers up through his hair, looked down at the mat, then up at the fanlight, then out into the street, then hard at his visitor. But he found nothing to say.

"Come to see my wife," the man repeated. "So now we can talk it over—as man to man."

Simmons slowly shut his mouth, and led the way upstairs mechanically, his fingers still in his hair. A sense of the state of affairs sank gradually into his brain, and the small devil woke again. Suppose this man was Ford? Suppose he did claim his wife? Would it be a knock-down blow? Would it hit him out?—or not? He thought of the trousers, the tea-things, the mangling, the knives, the kettles, and the windows; and he thought of them in the way of a backslider.

On the landing Ford clutched at his arm, and asked in a hoarse whisper, "'Ow long 'fore she's back?"

"'Bout an hour, I expect," Simmons replied, having first of all repeated the question in his own mind. And then he opened the parlour door.

"Ah," said Ford, looking about him, "you've bin pretty comf'table. Them chairs an' things," jerking his pipe toward them, "was hers—mine, that is to say, speakin' straight, and man to man." He sat down, puffing meditatively at his pipe, and presently, "Well," he continued, "'ere I am agin, ol' Bob Ford, dead an' done for—gone down in the Mooltan. On'y I ain't done for, see?" And he pointed the stem of his pipe at Simmons's waistcoat. "I ain't done for, 'cause why? Cons'kence o' bein' picked up by a ol' German sailin'-'utch an' took to 'Frisco 'fore the mast. I've 'ad a few years o' knockin' about since then, an' now"—looking hard at Simmons—"I've come back to see my wife."

"She—she don't like smoke in 'ere," said Simmons, as it were at random.

"No, I bet she don't," Ford answered, taking his pipe from his mouth and holding it low in his hand. "I know 'Anner. 'Ow d' you find 'er? Do she make ye clean the winders?"

"Well," Simmons admitted, uneasily, "I—I do 'elp 'er sometimes, o' course."

"Ah! An' the knives too, I bet, an' the bloomin' kittles. I know. W'y"—he rose and bent to look behind Simmons's head—"s' 'elp me, I b'lieve she cuts yer 'air! Well, I'm dammed! Jes' wot she would do, too."

He inspected the blushing Simmons from divers points of vantage. Then he lifted a leg of the trousers hanging behind the door. "I'd bet a trifle," he said, "she made these 'ere trucks. No-body else 'ud do 'em like that. Damme! they're wuss'n wot you've got on."

The small devil began to have the argument all its own way. If this man took his wife back perhaps he'd have to wear those trousers.

"Ah," Ford pursued, "she ain't got no milder. An', my davy, wot a jore!"

Simmons began to feel that this was no longer his business. Plainly, 'Anner was this other man's wife, and he was bound in honour to acknowledge the fact. The small devil put it to him as a matter of duty.

"Well," said Ford, suddenly, "time's short an' this ain't business. I won't be 'ard on you, matey. I ought prop'ly to stand on my rights, but seein' as you're a well-meaning young man, so to speak, an' all settled an' a-livin' 'ere quiet an' matrimonual, I'll"—this with a burst of generosity—"damme! yus, I'll compound the felony an' take me 'ook. Come, I'll name a figure, as man to man, fust an' last, no less an' no more. Five pound does it."

Simmons hadn't five pounds,—he hadn't even fivepence,—and he said so. "An' I wouldn't think to come between a man an' 'is wife," he added, "not on no account. It may be rough on me, but it's a dooty. I'll 'ook it."

"No," said Ford, hastily, clutching Simmons by the arm, "don't do that. I'll make it a bit cheaper. Say three quid—come, that's reasonable, ain't it? Three quid ain't much compensation for me goin' away for ever—where the stormy winds do blow, so to say—an' never as much as seein' me own wife agin for better nor wuss. Between man an' man, now, three quid, an' I'll shunt. That's fair, ain't it?"

"Of course it's fair," Simmons replied, effusively. "It's more'n fair: it's noble—downright noble, I call it. But I ain't goin' to take a mean advantage o' your good-'artedness, Mr. Ford. She's your wife, an' I oughtn't to 'a' come between you. I apologise. You stop an' 'ave yer proper rights. It's me as ought to shunt, an' I will." And he made a step toward the door.

"'Old on," quoth Ford, and got between Simmons and the door; "don't do things rash. Look wot a loss it'll be to you with no 'ome to go to, an' nobody to look after ye, an' all that. It'll be dreadful. Say a couple—there, we won't quarrel, jest a single quid, between man an' man, an' I'll stand a pot out o' the money. You can easy raise a quid—the clock 'ud pretty nigh do it. A quid does it, an' I'll—"

There was a loud double knock at the front door. In the East End a double knock is always for the upstairs lodgers.

"Oo's that?" asked Bob Ford, apprehensively.

"I'll see," said Thomas Simmons, in reply, and he made a rush for the staircase.

Bob Ford heard him open the front door. The he went to the window, and just below him he saw the crown of a bonnet. It vanished, and borne to him from within the door there fell upon his ear the sound of a well-remembered female voice.

"Where ye goin' now with no 'at?" asked the voice, sharply.

"Awright, 'Anner—there's—there's somebody upstairs to see you," Simmons answered. And, as Bob Ford could see, a man went scuttling down the street in the gathering dusk. And behold, it was Thomas Simmons.

Ford reached the landing in three strides. His wife was still at the front door, staring after Simmons. He flung into the back room, threw open the window, dropped from the wash-house roof into the back yard, scrambled desperately over the fence, and disappeared into the gloom. He was seen by no living soul. And that is why Simmons's base desertion—under his wife's very eyes, too—is still an astonishment to the neighbours.



A ROSE OF THE GHETTO, By Israel Zangwill

One day it occurred to Leibel that he ought to get married. He went to Sugarman the Shadchan forthwith.

"I have the very thing for you," said the great marriage broker.

"Is she pretty?" asked Leibel.

"Her father has a boot and shoe warehouse," replied Sugarman, enthusiastically.

"Then there ought to be a dowry with her," said Leibel, eagerly.

"Certainly a dowry! A fine man like you!"

"How much do you think it would be?"

"Of course it is not a large warehouse; but then you could get your boots at trade price, and your wife's, perhaps, for the cost of the leather."

"When could I see her?"

"I will arrange for you to call next Sabbath afternoon."

"You won't charge me more than a sovereign?"

"Not a groschen more! Such a pious maiden! I'm sure you will be happy. She has so much way-of-the-country [breeding]. And of course five per cent on the dowry?"

"H'm! Well, I don't mind!" "Perhaps they won't give a dowry," he thought with a consolatory sense of outwitting the Shadchan.

On the Saturday Leibel went to see the damsel, and on the Sunday he went to see Sugarman the Shadchan.

"But your maiden squints!" he cried, resentfully.

"An excellent thing!" said Sugarman. "A wife who squints can never look her husband straight in the face and overwhelm him. Who would quail before a woman with a squint?"

"I could endure the squint," went on Leibel, dubiously, "but she also stammers."

"Well, what is better, in the event of a quarrel? The difficulty she has in talking will keep her far more silent than most wives. You had best secure her while you have the chance."

"But she halts on the left leg," cried Leibel, exasperated.

"Gott in Himmel! Do you mean to say you do not see what an advantage it is to have a wife unable to accompany you in all your goings?"

Leibel lost patience.

"Why, the girl is a hunchback!" he protested, furiously.

"My dear Leibel," said the marriage broker, deprecatingly shrugging his shoulders and spreading out his palms, "you can't expect perfection!"

Nevertheless Leibel persisted in his unreasonable attitude. He accused Sugarman of wasting his time, of making a fool of him.

"A fool of you!" echoed the Shadchan, indignantly, "when I give you a chance of a boot and shoe manufacturer's daughter? You will make a fool of yourself if you refuse. I dare say her dowry would be enough to set you up as a master tailor. At present you are compelled to slave away as a cutter for thirty shillings a week. It is most unjust. If you only had a few machines you would be able to employ your own cutters. And they can be got so cheap nowadays."

This gave Leibel pause, and he departed without having definitely broken the negotiations. His whole week was befogged by doubt, his work became uncertain, his chalk marks lacked their usual decision, and he did not always cut his coat according to his cloth. His aberrations became so marked that pretty Rose Green, the sweater's eldest daughter, who managed a machine in the same room, divined, with all a woman's intuition, that he was in love.

"What is the matter?" she said, in rallying Yiddish, when they were taking their lunch of bread and cheese and ginger-beer amid the clatter of machines, whose serfs had not yet knocked off work.

"They are proposing me a match," he answered, sullenly.

"A match!" ejaculated Rose. "Thou!" She had worked by his side for years, and familiarity bred the second person singular. Leibel nodded his head, and put a mouthful of Dutch cheese into it.

"With whom?" asked Rose. Somehow he felt ashamed. He gurgled the answer into the stone ginger-beer bottle, which he put to his thirsty lips.

"With Leah Volcovitch!"

"Leah Volcovitch!" gasped Rose. "Leah, the boot and shoe manufacturer's daughter?"

Leibel hung his head—he scarce knew why. He did not dare meet her gaze. His droop said "Yes." There was a long pause.

"And why dost thou not have her?" said Rose. It was more than an inquiry; there was contempt in it, and perhaps even pique.

Leibel did not reply. The embarrassing silence reigned again, and reigned long. Rose broke it at last.

"Is it that thou likest me better?" she asked.

Leibel seemed to see a ball of lightning in the air; it burst, and he felt the electric current strike right through his heart. The shock threw his head up with a jerk, so that his eyes gazed into a face whose beauty and tenderness were revealed to him for the first time. The face of his old acquaintance had vanished; this was a cajoling, coquettish, smiling face, suggesting undreamed-of things.

"Nu, yes," he replied, without perceptible pause.

"Nu, good!" she rejoined as quickly.

And in the ecstasy of that moment of mutual understanding Leibel forgot to wonder why he had never thought of Rose before. Afterward he remembered that she had always been his social superior.

The situation seemed too dream-like for explanation to the room just yet. Leibel lovingly passed a bottle of ginger-beer, and Rose took a sip, with a beautiful air of plighting troth, understood only of those two. When Leibel quaffed the remnant it intoxicated him. The relics of the bread and cheese were the ambrosia to this nectar. They did not dare kiss; the suddenness of it all left them bashful, and the smack of lips would have been like a cannon-peal announcing their engagement. There was a subtler sweetness in this sense of a secret, apart from the fact that neither cared to break the news to the master tailor, a stern little old man. Leibel's chalk marks continued indecisive that afternoon, which shows how correctly Rose had connected them with love.

Before he left that night Rose said to him, "Art thou sure thou wouldst not rather have Leah Volcovitch?"

"Not for all the boots and shoes in the world," replied Leibel, vehemently.

"And I," protested Rose, "would rather go without my own than without thee."

The landing outside the workshop was so badly lighted that their lips came together in the darkness.

"Nay, nay; thou must not yet," said Rose. "Thou art still courting Leah Volcovitch. For aught thou knowest, Sugarman the Shadchan may have entangled thee beyond redemption."

"Not so," asserted Leibel. "I have only seen the maiden once."

"Yes. But Sugarman has seen her father several times," persisted Rose. "For so misshapen a maiden his commission would be large. Thou must go to Sugarman to-night, and tell him that thou canst not find it in thy heart to go on with the match."

"Kiss me, and I will go," pleaded Leibel.

"Go, and I will kiss thee," said Rose, resolutely.

"And when shall we tell thy father?" he asked, pressing her hand, as the next best thing to her lips.

"As soon as thou art free from Leah."

"But will he consent?"

"He will not be glad," said Rose, frankly. "But after mother's death—peace be upon her—the rule passed from her hands into mine."

"Ah, that is well," said Leibel. He was a superficial thinker.

Leibel found Sugarman at supper. The great Shadchan offered him a chair, but nothing else. Hospitality was associated in his mind with special occasions only, and involved lemonade and "stuffed monkeys."

He was very put out—almost to the point of indigestion—to hear of Leibel's final determination, and plied him with reproachful inquiries.

"You don't mean to say that you give up a boot and shoe manufacturer merely because his daughter has round shoulders!" he exclaimed, incredulously.

"It is more than round shoulders—it is a hump!" cried Leibel.

"And suppose? See how much better off you will be when you get your own machines! We do not refuse to let camels carry our burdens because they have humps."

"Ah, but a wife is not a camel," said Leibel, with a sage air.

"And a cutter is not a master tailor," retorted Sugarman.

"Enough, enough!" cried Leibel. "I tell you, I would not have her if she were a machine warehouse."

"There sticks something behind," persisted Sugarman, unconvinced.

Leibel shook his head. "Only her hump" he said with a flash of humour.

"Moses Mendelssohn had a hump," expostulated Sugarman, reproachfully.

"Yes, but he was a heretic," rejoined Leibel, who was not without reading. "And then he was a man! A man with two humps could find a wife for each. But a woman with a hump cannot expect a husband in addition."

"Guard your tongue from evil," quoth the Shadchan, angrily. "If everybody were to talk like you Leah Volcovitch would never be married at all."

Leibel shrugged his shoulders, and reminded him that hunchbacked girls who stammered and squinted and halted on left legs were not usually led under the canopy.

"Nonsense! Stuff!" cried Sugarman, angrily. "That is because they do not come to me."

"Leah Volcovitch has come to you," said Leibel, "but she shall not come to me." And he rose, anxious to escape.

Instantly Sugarman gave a sigh of resignation. "Be it so! Then I shall have to look out for another, that's all."

"No, I don't want any," replied Leibel, quickly.

Sugarman stopped eating. "You don't want any?" he cried. "But you came to me for one?"

"I—I—know," stammered Leibel. "But I've—I've altered my mind."

"One needs Hillel's patience to deal with you!" cried Sugarman. "But I shall charge you, all the same, for my trouble. You cannot cancel an order like this in the middle! No, no! You can play fast and loose with Leah Volcovitch, but you shall not make a fool of me."

"But if I don't want one?" said Leibel, sullenly.

Sugarman gazed at him with a cunning look of suspicion. "Didn't I say there was something sticking behind?"

Leibel felt guilty. "But whom have you got in your eye?" he inquired, desperately.

"Perhaps you may have some one in yours!" naively answered Sugarman.

Leibel gave a hypocritic long-drawn "U-m-m-m! I wonder if Rose Green—where I work—" he said, and stopped.

"I fear not," said Sugarman. "She is on my list. Her father gave her to me some months ago, but he is hard to please. Even the maiden herself is not easy, being pretty."

"Perhaps she has waited for some one," suggested Leibel.

Sugarman's keen ear caught the note of complacent triumph.

"You have been asking her yourself!" he exclaimed, in horror-stricken accents.

"And if I have?" said Leibel, defiantly.

"You have cheated me! And so has Eliphaz Green—I always knew he was tricky! You have both defrauded me!"

"I did not mean to," said Leibel, mildly.

"You did mean to. You had no business to take the matter out of my hands. What right had you to propose to Rose Green?"

"I did not," cried Leibel, excitedly.

"Then you asked her father!"

"No; I have not asked her father yet."

"Then how do you know she will have you?"

"I—I know," stammered Leibel, feeling himself somehow a liar as well as a thief. His brain was in a whirl; he could not remember how the thing had come about. Certainly he had not proposed; nor could he say that she had.

"You know she will have you," repeated Sugarman, reflectively. "And does she know?"

"Yes. In fact," he blurted out, "we arranged it together."

"Ah, you both know. And does her father know?"

"Not yet."

"Ah, then I must get his consent," said Sugarman, decisively.

"I—I thought of speaking to him myself."

"Yourself!" echoed Sugarman, in horror. "Are you unsound in the head? Why, that would be worse than the mistake you have already made!"

"What mistake?" asked Leibel, firing up.

"The mistake of asking the maiden herself. When you quarrel with her after your marriage she will always throw it in your teeth that you wished to marry her. Moreover, if you tell a maiden you love her, her father will think you ought to marry her as she stands. Still, what is done is done." And he sighed regretfully.

"And what more do I want? I love her."

"You piece of clay!" cried Sugarman, contemptuously. "Love will not turn machines, much less buy them. You must have a dowry. Her father has a big stocking; he can well afford it."

Leibel's eyes lit up. There was really no reason why he should not have bread and cheese with his kisses.

"Now, if you went to her father," pursued the Shadchan, "the odds are that he would not even give you his daughter—to say nothing of the dowry. After all, it is a cheek of you to aspire so high. As you told me from the first, you haven't saved a penny. Even my commission you won't be able to pay till you get the dowry. But if I go I do not despair of getting a substantial sum—to say nothing of the daughter."

"Yes, I think you had better go," said Leibel, eagerly.

"But if I do this thing for you I shall want a pound more," rejoined Sugarman.

"A pound more!" echoed Leibel, in dismay. "Why?"

"Because Rose Green's hump is of gold," replied Sugarman, oracularly. "Also, she is fair to see, and many men desire her."

"But you have always your five per cent, on the dowry."

"It will be less than Volcovitch's," explained Sugarman. "You see, Green has other and less beautiful daughters."

"Yes, but then it settles itself more easily. Say five shillings."

"Eliphaz Green is a hard man," said the Shadchan instead.

"Ten shillings is the most I will give!"

"Twelve and sixpence is the least I will take. Eliphaz Green haggles so terribly."

They split the difference, and so eleven and threepence represented the predominance of Eliphaz Green's stinginess over Volcovitch's.

The very next day Sugarman invaded the Green workroom. Rose bent over her seams, her heart fluttering. Leibel had duly apprised her of the roundabout manner in which she would have to be won, and she had acquiesced in the comedy. At the least it would save her the trouble of father-taming.

Sugarman's entry was brusque and breathless. He was overwhelmed with joyous emotion. His blue bandana trailed agitatedly from his coat-tail.

"At last!" he cried, addressing the little white-haired master tailor; "I have the very man for you."

"Yes?" grunted Eliphaz, unimpressed. The monosyllable was packed with emotion. It said, "Have you really the face to come to me again with an ideal man?"

"He has all the qualities that you desire," began the Shadchan, in a tone that repudiated the implications of the monosyllable. "He is young, strong, God-fearing—"

"Has he any money?" grumpily interrupted Eliphaz.

"He will have money," replied Sugarman, unhesitatingly, "when he marries."

"Ah!" The father's voice relaxed, and his foot lay limp on the treadle. He worked one of his machines himself, and paid himself the wages so as to enjoy the profit. "How much will he have?"

"I think he will have fifty pounds; and the least you can do is to let him have fifty pounds," replied Sugarman, with the same happy ambiguity.

Eliphaz shook his head on principle.

"Yes, you will," said Sugarman, "when you learn how fine a man he is."

The flush of confusion and trepidation already on Leibel's countenance became a rosy glow of modesty, for he could not help overhearing what was being said, owing to the lull of the master tailor's machine.

"Tell me, then," rejoined Eliphaz.

"Tell me, first, if you will give fifty to a young, healthy, hard-working, God-fearing man, whose idea it is to start as a master tailor on his own account? And you know how profitable that is!"

"To a man like that," said Eliphaz, in a burst of enthusiasm, "I would give as much as twenty-seven pounds ten!"

Sugarman groaned inwardly, but Leibel's heart leaped with joy. To get four months' wages at a stroke! With twenty-seven pounds ten he could certainly procure several machines, especially on the instalment system. Out of the corners of his eyes he shot a glance at Rose, who was beyond earshot.

"Unless you can promise thirty it is waste of time mentioning his name," said Sugarman.

"Well, well—who is he?"

Sugarman bent down, lowering his voice into the father's ear.

"What! Leibel!" cried Eliphaz, outraged.

"Sh!" said Sugarman, "or he will overhear your delight, and ask more. He has his nose high enough, as it is."

"B—b—b—ut," sputtered the bewildered parent, "I know Leibel myself. I see him every day. I don't want a Shadchan to find me a man I know—a mere hand in my own workshop!"

"Your talk has neither face nor figure," answered Sugarman, sternly. "It is just the people one sees every day that one knows least. I warrant that if I had not put it into your head you would never have dreamt of Leibel as a son-in-law. Come now, confess."

Eliphaz grunted vaguely, and the Shadchan went on triumphantly: "I thought as much. And yet where could you find a better man to keep your daughter?"

"He ought to be content with her alone," grumbled her father.

Sugarman saw the signs of weakening, and dashed in, full strength: "It's a question whether he will have her at all. I have not been to him about her yet. I awaited your approval of the idea." Leibel admired the verbal accuracy of these statements, which he had just caught.

"But I didn't know he would be having money," murmured Eliphaz.

"Of course you didn't know. That's what the Shadchan is for—to point out the things that are under your nose."

"But where will he be getting this money from?"

"From you," said Sugarman, frankly.

"From me?"

"From whom else? Are you not his employer? It has been put by for his marriage day."

"He has saved it?"

"He has not spent it," said Sugarman, impatiently.

"But do you mean to say he has saved fifty pounds?"

"If he could manage to save fifty pounds out of your wages he would be indeed a treasure," said Sugarman. "Perhaps it might be thirty."

"But you said fifty."

"Well, you came down to thirty," retorted the Shadchan. "You cannot expect him to have more than your daughter brings."

"I never said thirty," Eliphaz reminded him. "Twenty-seven ten was my last bid."

"Very well; that will do as a basis of negotiations," said Sugarman, resignedly. "I will call upon him this evening. If I were to go over and speak to him now, he would perceive you were anxious, and raise his terms, and that will never do. Of course you will not mind allowing me a pound more for finding you so economical a son-in-law?"

"Not a penny more."

"You need not fear," said Sugarman, resentfully. "It is not likely I shall be able to persuade him to take so economical a father-in-law. So you will be none the worse for promising."

"Be it so," said Eliphaz, with a gesture of weariness, and he started his machine again.

"Twenty-seven pounds ten, remember," said Sugarman, above the whir.

Eliphaz nodded his head, whirring his wheel-work louder.

"And paid before the wedding, mind."

The machine took no notice.

"Before the wedding, mind," repeated Sugarman. "Before we go under the canopy."

"Go now, go now!" grunted Eliphaz, with a gesture of impatience. "It shall all be well." And the white-haired head bowed immovably over its work.

In the evening Rose extracted from her father the motive of Sugarman's visit, and confessed that the idea was to her liking.

"But dost thou think he will have me, little father?" she asked, with cajoling eyes.

"Any one would have my Rose."

"Ah, but Leibel is different. So many years he has sat at my side and said nothing."

"He had his work to think of. He is a good, saving youth."

"At this very moment Sugarman is trying to persuade him—not so? I suppose he will want much money."

"Be easy, my child." And he passed his discoloured hand over her hair.

Sugarman turned up the next day, and reported that Leibel was unobtainable under thirty pounds, and Eliphaz, weary of the contest, called over Leibel, till that moment carefully absorbed in his scientific chalk marks, and mentioned the thing to him for the first time. "I am not a man to bargain," Eliphaz said, and so he gave the young man his tawny hand, and a bottle of rum sprang from somewhere, and work was suspended for five minutes, and the "hands" all drank amid surprised excitement. Sugarman's visits had prepared them to congratulate Rose; but Leibel was a shock.

The formal engagement was marked by even greater junketing, and at last the marriage day came. Leibel was resplendent in a diagonal frockcoat, cut by his own hand; and Rose stepped from the cab a medley of flowers, fairness, and white silk, and behind her came two bridesmaids,—her sisters,—a trio that glorified the spectator-strewn pavement outside the synagogue. Eliphaz looked almost tall in his shiny high hat and frilled shirt-front. Sugarman arrived on foot, carrying red-socked little Ebenezer tucked under his arm.

Leibel and Rose were not the only couple to be disposed of, for it was the thirty-third day of the Omer—a day fruitful in marriages.

But at last their turn came. They did not, however, come in their turn, and their special friends among the audience wondered why they had lost their precedence. After several later marriages had taken place a whisper began to circulate. The rumour of a hitch gained ground steadily, and the sensation was proportionate. And, indeed, the rose was not to be picked without a touch of the thorn.

Gradually the facts leaked out, and a buzz of talk and comment ran through the waiting synagogue. Eliphaz had not paid up!

At first he declared he would put down the money immediately after the ceremony. But the wary Sugarman, schooled by experience, demanded its instant delivery on behalf of his other client. Hard pressed, Eliphaz produced ten sovereigns from his trousers-pocket, and tendered them on account. These Sugarman disdainfully refused, and the negotiations were suspended. The bridegroom's party was encamped in one room, the bride's in another, and after a painful delay Eliphaz sent an emissary to say that half the amount should be forthcoming, the extra five pounds in a bright new Bank of England note. Leibel, instructed and encouraged by Sugarman, stood firm.

And then arose a hubbub of voices, a chaos of suggestions; friends rushed to and fro between the camps, some emerging from their seats in the synagogue to add to the confusion. But Eliphaz had taken his stand upon a rock—he had no more ready money. To-morrow, the next day, he would have some. And Leibel, pale and dogged, clutched tighter at those machines that were slipping away momently from him. He had not yet seen his bride that morning, and so her face was shadowy compared with the tangibility of those machines. Most of the other maidens were married women by now, and the situation was growing desperate. From the female camp came terrible rumours of bridesmaids in hysterics, and a bride that tore her wreath in a passion of shame and humiliation. Eliphaz sent word that he would give an I O U for the balance, but that he really could not muster any more current coin. Sugarman instructed the ambassador to suggest that Eliphaz should raise the money among his friends.

And the short spring day slipped away. In vain the minister, apprised of the block, lengthened out the formulae for the other pairs, and blessed them with more reposeful unction. It was impossible to stave off the Leibel-Green item indefinitely, and at last Rose remained the only orange-wreathed spinster in the synagogue. And then there was a hush of solemn suspense, that swelled gradually into a steady rumble of babbling tongues, as minute succeeded minute and the final bridal party still failed to appear. The latest bulletin pictured the bride in a dead faint. The afternoon was waning fast. The minister left his post near the canopy, under which so many lives had been united, and came to add his white tie to the forces for compromise. But he fared no better than the others. Incensed at the obstinacy of the antagonists, he declared he would close the synagogue. He gave the couple ten minutes to marry in or quit. Then chaos came, and pandemonium—a frantic babel of suggestion and exhortation from the crowd. When five minutes had passed a legate from Eliphaz announced that his side had scraped together twenty pounds, and that this was their final bid.

Leibel wavered; the long day's combat had told upon him; the reports of the bride's distress had weakened him. Even Sugarman had lost his cocksureness of victory. A few minutes more and both commissions might slip through his fingers. Once the parties left the synagogue, it would not be easy to drive them there another day. But he cheered on his man still: one could always surrender at the tenth minute.

At the eighth the buzz of tongues faltered suddenly, to be transposed into a new key, so to speak. Through the gesticulating assembly swept that murmur of expectation which crowds know when the procession is coming at last. By some mysterious magnetism all were aware that the BRIDE herself—the poor hysteric bride—had left the paternal camp, was coming in person to plead with her mercenary lover.

And as the glory of her and the flowers and the white draperies loomed upon Leibel's vision his heart melted in worship, and he knew his citadel would crumble in ruins at her first glance, at her first touch. Was it fair fighting? As his troubled vision cleared, and as she came nigh unto him, he saw to his amazement that she was speckless and composed—no trace of tears dimmed the fairness of her face, there was no disarray in her bridal wreath.

The clock showed the ninth minute.

She put her hand appeallingly on his arm, while a heavenly light came into her face—the expression of a Joan of Arc animating her country.

"Do not give in, Leibel!" she said. "Do not have me! Do not let them persuade thee! By my life, thou must not! Go home!"

So at the eleventh minute the vanquished Eliphaz produced the balance, and they all lived happily ever afterward.



AN IDYL OF LONDON, By Beatrice Harraden

It was one o'clock, and many of the students in the National Gallery had left off work and were refreshing themselves with lunch and conversation. There was one old worker who had not stirred from his place, but he had put down his brush, and had taken from his pocket a small book, which was like its owner—thin and shabby of covering. He seemed to find pleasure in reading it, for he turned over its pages with all the tenderness characteristic of one who loves what he reads. Now and again he glanced at his unfinished copy of the beautiful portrait of Andrea del Sarto, and once his eyes rested on another copy next to his, better and truer than his, and once he stopped to pick up a girl's prune-coloured tie, which had fallen from the neighbouring easel. After this he seemed to become unconscious of his surroundings, as unconscious, indeed, as any one of the pictures near him. Any one might have been justified in mistaking him for the portrait of a man, but that his lips moved; for it was his custom to read softly to himself.

The students passed back to their places, not troubling to notice him, because they knew from experience that he never noticed them, and that all greetings were wasted on him and all words were wanton expenditure of breath. They had come to regard him very much in the same way as many of us regard the wonders of nature, without astonishment, without any questionings, and often without any interest. One girl, a new-comer, did chance to say to her companion:

"How ill that old man looks!"

"Oh, he always looks like that," was the answer. "You will soon get accustomed to him. Come along! I must finish my 'Blind Beggar' this afternoon."

In a few minutes most of the workers were busy again, although there were some who continued to chat quietly, and several young men who seemed reluctant to leave their girl friends, and who were by no means encouraged to go! One young man came to claim his book and pipe, which he had left in the charge of a bright-eyed girl, who was copying Sir Joshua's "Angels." She gave him his treasures, and received in exchange a dark-red rose, which she fastened in her belt; and then he returned to his portrait of Mrs. Siddons. But there was something in his disconsolate manner which made one suspect that he thought less of Mrs. Siddons's beauty than of the beauty of the girl who was wearing the dark-red rose! The strangers, strolling through the rooms, stopped now and again to peer curiously at the students' work. They were stared at indignantly by the students themselves, but they made no attempt to move away, and even ventured sometimes to pass criticisms of no tender character on some of the copies. The fierce-looking man who was copying "The Horse Fair" deliberately put down his brushes, folded his arms, and waited defiantly until they had gone by; but others, wiser in their generation, went on painting calmly. Several workers were painting the new Raphael; one of them was a white-haired old gentlewoman, whose hand was trembling, and yet skilful still. More than once she turned to give a few hints to the young girl near her, who looked in some distress and doubt. Just the needful help was given, and then the girl plied her brush merrily, smiling the while with pleasure and gratitude. There seemed to be a genial, kindly influence at work, a certain homeliness too, which must needs assert itself where many are gathered together, working side by side. All made a harmony; the wonderful pictures, collected from many lands and many centuries, each with its meaning and its message from the past; the ever-present memories of the painters themselves, who had worked and striven and conquered; and the living human beings, each with his wealth of earnest endeavour and hope.

Meanwhile the old man read on uninterruptedly until two hands were put over his book and a gentle voice said:

"Mr. Lindall, you have had no lunch again. Do you know, I begin to hate Lucretius. He always makes you forget your food."

The old man looked up, and something like a smile passed over his joyless face when he saw Helen Stanley bending over him.

"Ah," he answered, "you must not hate Lucretius. I have had more pleasant hours with him than with any living person."

He rose and came forward to examine her copy of Andrea del Sarto's portrait.

"Yours is better than mine," he said, critically; "in fact, mine is a failure. I think I shall only get a small price for mine; indeed, I doubt whether I shall get sufficient to pay for my funeral."

"You speak dismally," she answered, smiling.

"I missed you yesterday," he continued, half dreamily. "I left my work, and I wandered through the rooms, and I did not even read Lucretius. Something seemed to have gone from my life. At first I thought it must be my favourite Raphael, or the Murillo; but it was neither the one nor the other; it was you. That was strange, wasn't it? But you know we get accustomed to anything, and perhaps I should have missed you less the second day, and by the end of a week I should not have missed you at all. Mercifully, we have in us the power of forgetting."

"I do not wish to plead for myself," she said, "but I do not believe that you or any one could really forget. That which outsiders call forgetfulness might be called by the better name of resignation."

"I don't care about talking any more now," he said, suddenly, and he went to his easel and worked silently at his picture; and Helen Stanley glanced at him, and thought she had never seen her old companion look so forlorn and desolate as he did to-day. He looked as if no gentle hand had ever been placed on him in kindliness and affection, and that seemed to her a terrible thing; for she was one of those prehistorically minded persons who persist in believing that affection is as needful to human life as rain to flower life. When first she came to work at the gallery—some twelve months ago—she had noticed this old man, and had wished for his companionship; she was herself lonely and sorrowful, and, although young, had to fight her own battles, and had learned something of the difficulties of fighting, and this had given her an experience beyond her years. She was not more than twenty-four years of age, but she looked rather older, and, though she had beautiful eyes, full of meaning and kindness, her features were decidedly plain as well as unattractive. There were some in the gallery who said among themselves that, as Mr. Lindall had waited so many years before talking to any one, he might have chosen some one better worth the waiting for! But they soon became accustomed to seeing Helen Stanley and Mr. Lindall together, and they laughed less than before; and meanwhile the acquaintance ripened into a sort of friendship, half sulky on his part and wholly kind on her part. He told her nothing about himself, and he asked nothing about herself; for weeks he never even knew her name. Sometimes he did not speak at all, and the two friends would work silently side by side until it was time to go; and then he waited until she was ready, and walked with her across Trafalgar Square, where they parted and went their own ways.

But occasionally, when she least expected it, he would speak with glowing enthusiasm on art; then his eyes seemed to become bright, and his bent figure more erect, and his whole bearing proud and dignified. There were times, too, when he would speak on other subjects: on the morality of free thought—on Bruno, of blessed memory, on him, and scores of others too. He would speak of the different schools of philosophy; he would laugh at himself, and at all who, having given time and thought to the study of life's complicated problems, had not reached one step further than the Old-World thinkers. Perhaps he would quote one of his favourite philosophers, and then suddenly relapse into silence, returning to his wonted abstraction and to his indifference to his surroundings. Helen Stanley had learned to understand his ways and to appreciate his mind, and, without intruding on him in any manner, had put herself gently into his life as his quiet champion and his friend. No one in her presence dared speak slightingly of the old man, or to make fun of his tumble-down appearance, or of his worn-out silk hat with a crack in the side, or of his rag of a black tie, which, together with his overcoat, had "seen better days." Once she brought her needle and thread, and darned the torn sleeve during her lunch-time; and, though he never knew it, it was a satisfaction to her to have helped him.

To-day she noticed that he was painting badly, and that he seemed to take no interest in his work; but she went on busily with her own picture, and was so engrossed in it that she did not at first observe that he had packed up his brushes and was preparing to go home.

"Three more strokes," he said, quietly, "and you will have finished your picture. I shall never finish mine; perhaps you will be good enough to set it right for me. I am not coming here again. I don't seem to have caught the true expression; what do you think? But I am not going to let it worry me, for I am sure you will promise to do your best for me. See, I will hand over these colours and these brushes to you, and no doubt you will accept the palette as well. I have no further use for it."

Helen Stanley took the palette which he held out toward her, and looked at him as though she would wish to question him.

"It is very hot here," he continued, "and I am going out. I am tired of work."

He hesitated, and then added, "I should like you to come with me, if you can spare the time."

She packed up her things at once, and the two friends moved slowly away, he gazing absently at the pictures, and she wondering in her mind as to the meaning of his strange mood.

When they were on the steps inside the building, he turned to Helen Stanley and said:

"I should like to go back to the pictures once more. I feel as if I must stand among them just a little longer. They have been my companions for so long that they are almost part of myself. I can close my eyes and recall them faithfully. But I want to take a last look at them; I want to feel once more the presence of the great masters, and to refresh my mind with their genius. When I look at their work I think of their life, and can only wonder at their death. It was so strange that they should die."

They went back together, and he took her to his favourite pictures, but remained speechless before them, and she did not disturb his thoughts. At last he said:

"I am ready to go. I have said farewell to them all. I know nothing more wonderful than being among a number of fine pictures. It is almost overwhelming. Once expects nature to be grand, but one does not expect man to be grand."

"You know we don't agree there," she answered. "I expect everything grand and great from man."

They went out of the gallery, and into Trafalgar Square. It was a scorching afternoon in August, but there was some cooling comfort in seeing the dancing water of the fountains sparkling so brightly in the sunshine.

"Do you mind stopping here a few minutes?" he said. "I should like to sit down and watch. There is so much to see."

She led the way to a seat, one end of which was occupied by a workman, who was sleeping soundly, and snoring too, his arms folded tightly together. He had a little clay pipe in the corner of his mouth; it seemed to be tucked in so snugly that there was not much danger of its falling to the ground. At last Helen spoke to her companion.

"What do you mean by saying that you will not be able to finish your picture? Perhaps you are not well. Indeed, you don't look well. You make me anxious, for I have a great regard for you."

"I am ill and suffering," he answered, quietly. "I thought I should have died yesterday; but I made up my mind to live until I saw you again, and I thought I would ask you to spend the afternoon with me, and go with me to Westminster Abbey, and sit with me in the cloisters. I do not feel able to go by myself, and I know of no one to ask except you; and I believed you would not refuse me, for you have been very kind to me. I do not quite understand why you have been kind to me, but I am wonderfully grateful to you. Today I heard some one in the gallery say that you were plain. I turned round and I said, 'I beg your pardon; I think she is very beautiful.' I think they laughed, and that puzzled me; for you have always seemed to me a very beautiful person."

At that moment the little clay pipe fell from the workman's mouth and was broken into bits. He awoke with a start, gazed stupidly at the old man and his companion, and at the broken clay pipe.

"Curse my luck!" he said, yawning. "I was fond of that damned little pipe."

The old man drew his own pipe and his own tobacco-pouch from his pocket.

"Take these, stranger," he said. "I don't want them. And good luck to you."

The man's face brightened up as he took the pipe and pouch.

"You're uncommon kind," he said. "Can you spare them?" he added, holding them out half reluctantly.

"Yes," answered the old man; "I shall not smoke again. You may as well have these matches too."

The labourer put them in his pocket, smiled his thanks, and walked some little distance off; and Helen watched him examine his new pipe, and then fill it with tobacco and light it.

Mr. Lindall proposed that they should be getting on their way to Westminster, and they soon found themselves in the abbey. They sat together in the Poets' Corner; a smile of quiet happiness broke over the old man's tired face as he looked around and took in all the solemn beauty and grandeur of the resting-place of the great.

"You know," he said, half to himself, half to his companion, "I have no belief of any kind, and no hopes and no fears; but all through my life it has been a comfort to me to sit quietly in a church or a cathedral. The graceful arches, the sun shining through the stained windows, the vaulted roof, the noble columns, have helped me to understand the mystery which all our books of philosophy cannot make clear, though we bend over them year after year, and grow old over them, old in age and in spirit. Though I myself have never been outwardly a worshipper, I have never sat in a place of worship but that, for the time being, I have felt a better man. But directly the voice of doctrine or dogma was raised the spell was broken for me, and that which I hoped was being made clear had no further meaning for me. There was only one voice which ever helped me, the voice of the organ, arousing me, thrilling me, filling me with strange longing, with welcome sadness, with solemn gladness. I have always thought that music can give an answer when everything else is of no avail. I do not know what you believe."

"I am so young to have found out," she said, almost pleadingly.

"Don't worry yourself," he answered, kindly. "Be brave and strong, and let the rest go. I should like to live long enough to see what you will make of your life. I believe you will never be false to yourself or to any one. That is rare. I believe you will not let any lower ideal take the place of your high ideal of what is beautiful and noble in art, in life. I believe that you will never let despair get the upper hand of you. If it does you may as well die; yes, you may as well. And I entreat you not to lose your entire faith in humanity. There is nothing like that for withering up the very core of the heart. I tell you, humanity and nature have so much in common with each other that if you lose part of your pleasure in the latter; you will see less beauty in the trees, the flowers, and the fields, less grandeur in the mighty mountains and the sea. The seasons will come and go, and you will scarcely heed their coming and going: winter will settle over your soul, just as it settled over mine. And you see what I am."

They had now passed into the cloisters, and they sat down in one of the recesses of the windows, and looked out upon the rich plot of grass which the cloisters enclose. There was not a soul there except themselves; the cool and the quiet and the beauty of the spot refreshed these pilgrims, and they rested in calm enjoyment.

Helen was the first to break the silence.

"I am glad you have brought me here," she said; "I shall never grumble now at not being able to afford a fortnight in the country. This is better than anything else."

"It has always been my summer holiday to come here," he said. "When I first came I was like you, young and hopeful, and I had wonderful visions of what I intended to do and to be. Here it was I made a vow that I would become a great painter, and win for myself a resting place in this very abbey. There is humour in the situation, is there not?"

"I don't like to hear you say that," she answered. "It is not always possible for us to fulfil all our ambitions. Still, it is better to have had them, and failed of them, than not to have had them at all."

"Possibly," he replied, coldly. Then he added, "I wish you would tell me about yourself. You have always interested me."

"I have nothing to tell you about myself," she answered, frankly. "I am alone in the world, without friends and without relations. The very name I use is not a real name. I was a foundling. At times I am sorry I do not belong to any one, and at other times I am glad. You know I am fond of books and of art, so my life is not altogether empty; and I find my pleasure in hard work. When I saw you at the gallery I wished to know you, and I asked one of the students who you were. He told me you were a misanthrope. Then I did not care so much about knowing you, until one day you spoke to me about my painting, and that was the beginning of our friendship."

"Forty years ago," he said, sadly, "the friend of my boyhood deceived me. I had not thought it possible that he could be false to me. He screened himself behind me, and became prosperous and respected at the expense of my honour. I vowed I would never again make a friend. A few years later, when I was beginning to hold up my head, the woman whom I loved deceived me. Then I put from me all affection and all love. Greater natures than mine are better able to bear these troubles, but my heart contracted and withered up."

He paused for a moment, many recollections overpowering him. Then he went on telling her the history of his life, unfolding to her the story of his hopes and ambitions, describing to her the very home where he was born, and the dark-eyed sister whom he had loved, and with whom he had played over the daisied fields, and through the carpeted woods, and all among the richly tinted bracken. One day he was told she was dead, and that he must never speak her name; but he spoke it all the day and all the night,—Beryl, nothing but Beryl,—and he looked for her in the fields and in the woods and among the bracken. It seemed as if he had unlocked the casket of his heart, closed for so many years, and as if all the memories of the past and all the secrets of his life were rushing out, glad to be free once more, and grateful for the open air of sympathy.

"Beryl was as swift as a deer!" he exclaimed. "You would have laughed to see her on the moor. Ah, it was hard to give up all the thoughts of meeting her again. They told me I should see her in heaven, but I did not care about heaven. I wanted Beryl on earth, as I knew her, a merry laughing sister. I think you are right: we don't forget; we become resigned in a dead, dull kind of way."

Suddenly he said, "I don't know why I have told you all this. And yet it has been such a pleasure to me. You are the only person to whom I could have spoken about myself, for no one else but you would have cared."

"Don't you think," she said gently, "that you made a mistake in letting your experiences embitter you? Because you had been unlucky in one or two instances it did not follow that all the world was against you. Perhaps you unconsciously put yourself against all the world, and therefore saw every one in an unfavourable light. It seems so easy to do that. Trouble comes to most people, doesn't it? And your philosophy should have taught you to make the best of it. At least, that is my notion of the value of philosophy."

She spoke hesitatingly, as though she gave utterance to these words against her will.

"I am sure you are right, child," he said, eagerly.

He put his hands to his eyes, but he could not keep back the tears.

"I have been such a lonely old man," he sobbed; "no one can tell what a lonely, loveless life mine has been. If I were not so old and so tired I should like to begin all over again."

He sobbed for many minutes, and she did not know what to say to him of comfort; but she took his hand within her own, and gently caressed it, as one might do to a little child in pain. He looked up and smiled through his tears.

"You have been very good to me," he said, "and I dare say you have thought me ungrateful. You mended my coat for me one morning, and not a day has passed but that I have looked at that darn and thought of you. I liked to remember that you had done it for me. But you have done far more than this for me: you have put some sweetness into my life. Whatever becomes of me hereafter, I shall never be able to think of my life on earth as anything but beautiful, because you thought kindly of me and acted kindly for me. The other night, when this terrible pain came over me, I wished you were near me; I wished to hear your voice. There is very beautiful music in your voice."

"I would have come to you gladly," she said, smiling quietly at him. "You must make a promise that when you feel ill again you will send for me. Then you will see what a splendid nurse I am, and how soon you will become strong and well under my care, strong enough to paint many more pictures, each one better than the last. Now will you promise?"

"Yes," he said, and he raised her hand reverently to his lips.

"You are not angry with me for doing that?" he asked, suddenly. "I should not like to vex you."

"I am not vexed," she answered, kindly.

"Then perhaps I may kiss it once more?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered; and again he raised her hand to his lips.

"Thank you," he said quietly; "that was kind of you. Do you see that broken sun-ray yonder? Is it not golden? I find it very pleasant to sit here; and I am quite happy, and almost free from pain. Lately I have been troubled with a dull thudding pain near my heart; but now I feel so strong that I believe I shall finish that Andrea del Sarto after all."

"Of course you will," she answered, cheerily, "and I shall have to confess that yours is better than mine! I am quite willing to yield the palm to you."

"I must alter the expression of the mouth," he replied. "That is the part which has worried me. I don't think I told you that I have had a commission to copy Rembrandt's 'Old Jew.' I must set to work on that next week."

"But you have given me your palette and brushes!" she laughed.

"You must be generous enough to lend them to me," he said, smiling. "By the way, I intend to give you my books, all of them. Some day I must show them to you. I especially value my philosophical books; they have been my faithful companions through many years. I believe you do not read Greek. That is a pity, because you would surely enjoy Aristotle. I think I must teach you Greek; it would be an agreeable legacy to leave you when I pass away into the Great Silence."

"I should like to learn," she said, wondering to hear him speak so unreservedly. It seemed as if some vast barrier had been rolled aside, and as if she were getting to know him better, having been allowed to glance into his past life, to sympathise with his past mistakes, and with the failure of his ambitions, and with the deadening of his heart.

"You must read AEschylus," he continued, enthusiastically; "and, if I mistake not, the Agamemnon will be an epoch in your life. You will find that all these studies will serve to ennoble your art, and you will be able to put mind into your work, and not merely form and colour. Do you know, I feel so well that I believe I shall not only live to finish Andrea del Sarto, but also to smoke another pipe?"

"You have been too rash to-day," she laughed, "giving away your pipe and pouch, your palette and brushes, in this reckless manner! I must get you a new pipe to-morrow. I wonder you did not part with your venerable Lucretius."

"That reminds me," he said, fumbling in his pocket; "I think I have dropped my Lucretius. I fancy I left it somewhere in the Poets' Corner. It would grieve me to lose that book."

"Let me go and look for it," she said, and she advanced a few steps, and then came back to him.

"You have been saying many kind words to me," she said, as she put her hand on his arm, "and I have not told you that I value your friendship, and am grateful to you for letting me be more than a mere stranger to you. I have been very lonely in my life, for I am not one to make friends easily, and it has been a great privilege to me to talk with you. I want you to know this: for if I have been anything to you, you have been a great deal to me. I have never met with much sympathy from those of my own age: I have found them narrow and unyielding, and they found me dull and uninteresting. They had passed through few experiences and knew nothing about failure or success, and some of them did not even understand the earnestness of endeavour, and laughed at me when I spoke of a high ideal. So I withdrew into myself, and should probably have grown still more isolated than I was before, but that I met you, and, as time went on, we became friends. I shall always remember your teaching, and I will try to keep to a high ideal of life and art and endeavour, and I will not let despair creep into my heart, and I will not lose my faith in humanity."

As she spoke a lingering ray of sunshine lit up her face and gently caressed her soft brown hair; slight though her form, sombre her clothes, and unlovely her features, she seemed a gracious presence because of her earnestness.

"Now," she said, cheerily, "you rest here until I come back with your Lucretius, and then I think I must be getting on my way home. But you must fix a time for our first Greek lesson, for we must begin to-morrow."

When she had gone he walked in the cloisters, holding his hat in his hand and his stick under his arm. There was a quiet smile on his face, which was called forth by pleasant thoughts in his mind, and he did not look quite so shrunken and shrivelled as usual. His eyes were fixed on the ground, but he raised them, and observed a white cat creeping toward him. It came and rubbed itself against his foot, and, purring with all its might, seemed determined to win some kind of notice from him. The old man stooped down to stroke it, and was just touching its sleek coat when he suddenly withdrew his hand and groaned deeply. He struggled to the recess, and sank back. The stick fell on the stone with a clatter, and the battered hat rolled down beside it, and the white cat fled away in terror; but realising that there was no cause for alarm, it came back and crouched near the silent figure of the old man, watching him intently. Then it stretched out its paw and played with his hand, doing its utmost to coax him into a little fun; but he would not be coaxed, and the cat lost all patience with him, and left him to himself.

Meanwhile Helen Stanley was looking for the lost Lucretius in the Poets' Corner. She found it laying near Chaucer's tomb, and was just going to take it to her friend when she saw the workman to whom they had spoken in Trafalgar Square. He recognised her at once, and came toward her.

"I've been having a quiet half-hour here," he said. "It does me a sight of good to sit in the abbey."

"You should go into the cloisters," she said, kindly. "I have been sitting there with my friend. He will be interested to hear that you love this beautiful abbey."

"I should like to see him again," said the workman. "He had a kind way about him, and that pipe he gave me is an uncommon good one. Still, I am sorry I smashed the little clay pipe. I'd grown used to it. I'd smoked it ever since my little girl died and left me alone in the world. I used to bring my little girl here, and now I come alone. But it isn't the same thing."

"No, it could not be the same thing," said Helen, gently. "But you find some comfort here?"

"Some little comfort," he answered. "One can't expect much."

They went together into the cloisters, and as they came near the recess where the old man rested Helen said:

"Why, he has fallen asleep! He must have been very tired. And he has dropped his hat and stick. Thank you. If you will put them down there, I will watch by his side until he wakes up. I don't suppose he will sleep for long."

The workman stooped down to pick up the hat and stick, and glanced at the sleeper. Something in the sleeper's countenance arrested his attention. He turned to the girl, and saw that she was watching him.

"What is it?" she asked anxiously. "What is the matter with you?"

He tried to speak, but his voice failed him, and all he could do was to point with trembling hand to the old man.

Helen looked, and a loud cry broke from her lips. The old man was dead.



THE OMNIBUS, By Quiller-Couch

All that follows was spoken in a small tavern, a stone's throw from Cheapside, the day before I left London. It was spoken in a dull voice, across a greasy table-cloth, and amid an atmosphere so thick with the reek of cooking that one longed to change it for the torrid street again, to broil in an ampler furnace. Old Tom Pickford spoke it, who has been a clerk for fifty-two years in Tweedy's East India warehouse, and in all that time has never been out of London, but when he takes a holiday spends it in hanging about Tweedy's, and observing that unlovely place of business from the outside. The dust, if not the iron, of Tweedy's has entered into his soul; and Tweedy's young men know him as "the Mastodon." He is a thin, bald septuagenarian, with sloping shoulders, and a habit of regarding the pavement when he walks, so that he seems to steer his way by instinct rather than sight. In general he keeps silence while eating his chop; and on this occasion there was something unnatural in his utterance, a divorce of manner between the speaker and his words, such as one would expect in a sibyl disclaiming under stress of the god. I fancied it had something to do with a black necktie that he wore instead of the blue bird's-eye cravat familiar to Tweedy's, and with his extraordinary conduct in refusing to-day the chop that the waiter brought, and limiting his lunch to cheese and lettuce.

Having pulled the lettuce to pieces, he pushed himself back a little from the table, looked over his spectacles at me, then at the table-cloth, and began in a dreamy voice:

"Old Gabriel is dead. I heard the news at the office this morning, and went out and bought a black tie. I am the oldest man in Tweedy's now—older by six years than Sam Collins, who comes next; so there is no mistake about it. Sam is looking for the place; I saw it in his eye when he told me, and I expect he'll get it. But I'm the oldest clerk in Tweedy's. Only God Almighty can alter that, and it's very satisfactory to me. I don't care about the money. Sam Collins will be stuck up over it, like enough; but he'll never write a hand like Gabriel's, not if he lives to be a hundred; and he knows it, and knows I'll be there to remind him of it. Gabriel's was a beautiful fist—so small, too, if he chose. Why, once, in his spare hours, he wrote out all the Psalms, with the headings, on one side of a folio sheet, and had it framed and hung up in his parlour, out at Shepherd's Bush. He died in the night—oh yes, quite easily. He was down at the office all yesterday, and spoke to me as brisk as a bird. They found him dead in his bed this morning.

"I seem cut up about it? Well, not exactly. Ah, you noticed that I refused my chop to-day. Bless your soul, that's not on Gabriel's account. I am well on in years, and I suppose it would be natural of me to pity old men, and expect pity. But I can't; no, it's only the young that I pity. If you must know, I didn't take the chop to-day because I haven't the money in my pocket to pay for it. You see, there was this black tie that I gave eighteenpence for; but something else happened this morning that I'll tell you about.

"I came down in a 'bus, as usual. You remember what muggy weather it was up to ten o'clock—though you wouldn't think it, to feel the heat now. Well, the 'bus was packed, inside and out. At least, there was just room for one more inside when we pulled up by Charing Cross, and there he got in—a boy with a stick and a bundle in a blue handkerchief.

"He wasn't more than thirteen; bound for the docks, you could tell at a glance; and by the way he looked about you could tell as easily that in stepping outside Charing Cross station he'd set foot on London stones for the first time. God knows how it struck him—the slush and drizzle, the ugly shop-fronts, the horses slipping in the brown mud, the crowd on the pavement pushing him this side and that. The poor little chap was standing in the middle of it with dazed eyes, like a hare's, when the 'bus pulled up. His eyelids were pink and swollen; but he wasn't crying, though he wanted to. Instead, he gave a gulp as he came on board with stick and bundle, and tried to look brave as a lion.

"I'd have given worlds to speak to him, but I couldn't. On my word, sir, I should have cried. It wasn't so much the little chap's look. But to the knot of his bundle there was tied a bunch of cottage flowers,—sweet-williams, boy's-love, and a rose or two,—and the sight and smell of them in that stuffy omnibus were like tears on thirsty eyelids. It's the young that I pity, sir. For Gabriel, in his bed up at Shepherd's Bush, there's no more to be said, as far as I can see; and as for me, I'm the oldest clerk in Tweedy's, which is very satisfactory. It's the young faces, set toward the road along which we have travelled, that trouble me. Sometimes, sir, I lie awake in my lodgings and listen, and the whole of this London seems filled with the sound of children's feet running, and I can sob aloud. You may say that it is only selfishness, and what I really pity is my own boyhood. I dare say you're right. It's certain that, as I kept glancing at the boy and his sea kit and his bunch of flowers, my mind went back to the January morning, sixty-five years back, when the coach took me off for the first time from the village where I was born to a London charity-school. I was worse off than the boy in the omnibus, for I had just lost father and mother. Yet it was the sticks and stones and flower-beds that I mostly thought of. I went round and said good-bye to the lilacs, and told them to be in flower by the time I came back. I said to the rose-bush, 'You must be as high as my window next May; you know you only missed it by three inches last summer.' Then I went to the cow-house, and kissed the cows, one by one. They were to be sold by auction the very next week, but I guessed nothing of it, and ordered them not to forget me. And last I looked at the swallows' nests under the thatch,—the last year's nests,—and told myself that they would be filled again when I returned. I remembered this, and how I stretched out my hands to the place from the coach-top; and how at Reading, where we stopped, I spent the two shillings that I possessed in a cocoanut and a bright clasp-knife; and how, when I opened it, the nut was sour; and how I cried myself to sleep, and woke in London.