'Che d'addends,' said a voice at a little distance; and Paul, guided by Pauer's hand upon his arm, groped his way towards it.

In the pale light outside the tent, the fog having cleared away, and a thin strip of moon hanging over the river, Paul dimly discerned a stout, broad-shouldered man of brief stature, who was half buried in a big fur overcoat An eyegla.s.s shone faintly beneath the brim of his silk hat The three made their way across the slippery field, and on to the firm high-road. They reached the inn to which Paul had run as a messenger a little while ago, and Pauer led the way to an upstair room where supper was laid, and a bright fire was blazing on the hearth. The guest needed no second invitation to be seated, but he made a poor meal, in spite of the best intentions. His companions disregarded him for a time, and spoke in a language he did not understand. He tried to disconnect and isolate their words, but they all seemed to run together. He fancied that Pauer talked in one tongue and his friend in another, but he knew later that this was a mere question of accent. When Paul was growing sleepy again the man with the eyegla.s.s spoke in English.

'Ask him, then.'

'My friend here,' said Pauer, 'Mr. George Darco, wants a smart, handy youngster. If you can give us a satisfactory account of how you came into your present condition, he will find you employment.'

Paul looked from one to the other, and both men regarded him seriously.

He blushed furiously, and his eyes fell.

'I suppose,' said Pauer, 'that you don't remember much of what you said to me on Sat.u.r.day night?

'I don't know,' Paul answered.

'Do you remember that I told you I was going with my show to Castle Barfield?

'No,' said Paul.

'Do you remember writing your father's address in my pocket-book, and telling me that he would do my printing for nothing if I told him I was a friend of yours?'

'No,' said Paul again. 'I didn't know I was so bad as that.'

'Do you remember a long screed you gave me about manly purity?'

'No,' said Paul once more. His voice would barely obey him.

'You went off in tow with that young woman. Do you remember that?'

'I know I did. I don't remember it.'

'She cleared you out, I suppose?' 'Yes.'

'And you were ashamed to go home? You hadn't money to pay your landlady?

'It wasn't that.'

'What was it, then?

'For G.o.d's sake don't ask me! I can't bear to think of it.

And then it all came out in an incoherent burst, through savagely choked tears. He had lost his honour. He was lowered in his own eyes. He would never be able to respect himself again. The two men stared at all this, wondering what lay behind it, until on a sudden the enigma became clear to both of them. The man with the eyegla.s.s laughed like a horse, whinnying and neighing in mirth unrestrainable. Paul blundered blindly at the door, but Pauer stepped nimbly and set his back against it.

'You young idiot!' he said in a friendly voice, which had a little quiver in it which was not inspired by merriment.

Mr. George Darco continued to laugh until he rolled from his chair to the floor. He rose gasping and weeping.

'Oh,' he said, 'vos there efer any think so vunny? Oh, somepoty holt me.

I shall tie of it.'

He recovered slowly, and seeing how deeply his laughter wounded the object of it, he tried to look solemn, but broke out again. Pauer spoke sharply to him in the foreign tongue he had used before, and he subdued himself.

'Go back to your chair and sit down,' said Pauer, laying a hand on Paul's shoulder. 'Don't make mountains out of molehills.'

The lad allowed himself to be pushed into a seat

'It's all very well for you, you gla.s.s-eyed old reprobate,' said Pauer, speaking in English. 'I can understand the boy if you can't.'

'You!' gasped Darco, with a new spurt of laughter. 'You!'

'Yes,' said Pauer, 'I.' His tone was angry, and his friend, after a humorous glance at him, poured out a gla.s.s of beer and drank it, but said no more. 'Stay there till I come back, said Pauer a minute or so later. 'I'll be back in a jiffy.'

Darco made a renewed onslaught on the cold boiled beef, as if he had been famishing. Paul sat still and stared at the fire. He was a compendium of shames, and whether he were more ashamed of his crime or his confession he could not tell. Pauer came back, accompanied by a man who looked like a hostler. The man carried a lighted candle and chewed thoughtfully at a straw.

'You'd better go to bed now,' said Pauer. 'This man will show you the way. When you're undressed, give him your clothes, and he'll have them dried and brushed for you by morning.'

Paul obeyed, and when he had handed over his clothes to the hostler's care he went to bed, and listened for awhile to the murmuring voices of Pauer and Darco, who were now immediately beneath him. His last resolve before he went to sleep was that in the morning he would go into the town and try to find work at his own trade; but he had begun to learn that he was born to drift, and he drifted. His clothes were brought to him clean and dry, and he turned the false cuffs and the collar he wore, so that he made himself in his own way sufficiently presentable, and just as he had finished dressing Pauer came into his room. There was a plentiful breakfast downstairs, and it was of a better quality than the aspect of the house might have seemed to warrant Paul did fall justice to it, and when the cloth was cleared Darco laid writing materials on the table. He said that his sight was failing, and that he had been advised to rest his eyes as much as possible. He would be obliged if Paul would write a letter for him from dictation. He dictated a lengthy business letter setting forth the terms on which he was willing to accept the management of a theatrical provincial tour, and when it was finished he asked Pauer to read it.

'That's all right,' said Pauer. 'Good legible fist. Well spelled.

Punctuation and capitals all right.'

'Ferry well,' said Darco. 'If the younk man wants a chop, I can give him one. Dwenty shillings a veek, and meals at the mittle of the tay.'

'What is the work?' Paul asked.

'To be my brivate zecretary,' said Darco, 'and to dravel with me through the gountry.'

'When am I to begin?'

'Now,' said Darco.

Paul sat down at the table, and his new employer dictated a great number of letters to him, all offering engagements to ladies and gentlemen, at salaries ranging from one pound to four pounds ten.

'What's all that for, George?' asked Pauer, who was sitting idly smoking by the fire.

'That is for Golding,' Darco announced. 'Younk Evans takes the management, but I haf the gontrol.'

'Getting your hands pretty full, ain't you, George?'

'Ah!' said Darco. 'Vait till I get my London theatre. I should haf been in London lonk ako if it had not been for Barton. He gild the boots that lace the golden legs.'

'What did he do?' asked Pauer.

'Gild the boots that lace the golden legs.'

'Killed the goose that lays the golden eggs, do you mean?'

'Man alife!' e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Darco. 'I zaid zo.'