But bah! I was not even sure! He _could_ not be contemplating it, and I was vile to think it.... Still, prudence. I must make sure. Till then, nothing--not even these thoughts that ticked as if out of a tape-machine from my brain. To-morrow....

Yet, ah! I was sure for all that!

This red and green, this red and green!

These are such fragments of it all as I can remember. I don't know how long they occupied me. I had begun to trace with my fingers little patterns on the deal top of my table, patterns that sometimes had a meaning for me, sometimes not, but that always had a meaning for Archie Merridew if he thought ... if he as much as thought....

Then the red and green advertis.e.m.e.nt was switched off suddenly. Only a rhomb of dim gaslight on my ceiling remained....

But I still sat in the darkness, my brain taking those backward and forward jerks, and my lips muttering, though without sound, that if he dreamed ... if he as much as dreamed....

III

It was a "record" even for myself to get the sack twice in one week, but that now befell me. They gave me no notice at the newspaper office, but they were decent, and I had a fortnight's wages in lieu of it. Pettinger especially showed himself my friend.

"It's rough on you," he said, "but I really don't see that anybody's to blame.... Look here, I'll tell you what we'll do. Go down to my place at Bedford; I'll telephone them you're coming; and you can do what there is to do in my garden for a week or two until something turns up. You won't mind working under the old chap I've got there? Right. Off you go.

You've got your money, haven't you?"

"I shall have to come up for Friday evening; I've a cla.s.s," I said.

"Well, have a change till then. You look as if you need it. Catch the twelve-fifty, and I'll telephone them now."

So I took off my sky-blue uniform and wondered, as I folded it neatly and laid it aside, where they were going to find the next man it would fit.

This was at half-past ten in the morning, so that I had some hours to spare. Ten minutes, if I could catch him, would suffice for all I had to say to Archie Merridew, and, as he was not an early riser, and had told me that he was not spending his days in bed, I hoped to find him before he went out. But as the Business College lay on the way I determined to call there first. I walked up Chancery Lane into Holborn.

But he had not arrived at the college when I got there, and I did not wait for him. I had walked home with him often enough to know his unvarying route, and I set off for his place half expecting to meet him on the way. But I did not meet him, so I knocked at the bra.s.s knocker of his ivy-green door.

Jane told me he had only that moment gone out.

"To the college?" I asked.

Jane thought so, but was not sure.

"If I don't see him I'll call again," I said. "Tell him, will you?"

I returned to the Business College, and there waited, talking to Kitty, who had just arrived.

Kitty seemed extremely embarra.s.sed that morning, and of course I guessed the reason. She had heard of the sky-blue uniform, doubtless through Archie. (For two nights I had not seen her.) I was none the less sure of this that she did not mention the circ.u.mstance directly; nor did she comment on my being at liberty at that unusual hour of the morning.

Presently she said:

"I don't think he'll come this morning now. He may this afternoon."

"I can't wait till the afternoon," I said, glancing at the little clock on the mantelpiece of the type-writing-room--the little clock that had given the "Ting" that had startled me so on the day of the examination in Method.

"Is it anything I can tell him?"

That, of course, was quite out of the question. "I'll see if he's back home yet," I replied.

Then Kitty's uneasiness and curiosity got the better of her delicacy about the sky-blue uniform. She looked fixedly at her thin wrists and her fingers gave little touches to the lace about them as she spoke.

"Jeff," she said timorously, "I don't know whether you know what--what they're saying about you--I'm sure it's a hideous lie, but--but it's upset me frightfully----" She stopped abruptly, and seemed even then to wish she had not spoken.

"You seem very easily upset nowadays," I said shortly, quite ready to quarrel if needs be.

But she ignored my tone. "You know they're saying--everybody's saying--all the people here, I mean."

"What?" I demanded.

But her courage failed her. She stopped the fiddling at her wrists, and, giving me a long look said, "You know I love you, Jeff, whatever happens----"

It was what I had begun to fear--that there would be no shaking her off.

She was far, far too faithful.

"I see," I said slowly. "I know what you mean.... Well, it was quite true. I _was_ a commissionaire--until an hour ago. They've sacked me....

I suppose Archie told you?"

"Girl-faced little wretch! But, Jeff----"

I took her up. "Well, it's that that I want to see him about. But as regards you and me--if you want it to make a difference----"

It was a plain offer to release her, but I don't think she understood it as that. Indeed, her manner puzzled me entirely. It was eager, shrinking, wistful and apprehensive all at once, and she appeared to be trying to shake off something--something preposterous. Well, that sky-blue uniform had been preposterous enough.

"It shall make a difference--if you wish," I offered again proudly.

"No," she murmured, apparently understanding this time, and busy with her lace again.

Then I entered into I know not what fantastic explanation of the curious fact that a man with the world in his grasp should have chosen to touch his cap to editors and proprietors. She tried to look as if she believed me, but it was plain that she didn't in the least. Once or twice she tried to interrupt me, but my patience was quickly running out.

"So you see how it was," I said at last, dropping my voice as Weston, the secretary-bird pa.s.sed. "It was no business of his, and I want to know what he's got to say about it. You can tell him so if you like."

Again that inexplicable look of timorousness came into her small eyes.

"You _mean_ the commissionaire's job, of course?" she said.

"I mean the commissionaire's job," I replied.

That, I thought with satisfaction, would cover my real reason for wishing to see Archie as well as anything else.

Weston pa.s.sed again, and gave me a look. That look struck me. It was just such a look as a policeman might give a loiterer whom he suspects, yet against whom he has no charge; and I felt my colour mount a little.

That tattling little animal! Little he cared, as long as he had his joke, that my five shillings was put in jeopardy. For a business college that styles itself advertis.e.m.e.nt writer "professor" naturally doesn't want commissionaires on its staff, and I saw my second dismissal looming ahead.