banjo, and a
voice raised at intervals in a kind of whoop announced that a nigger
entertainment was in progress. Recreation of this kind is not uncommon
on Sunday evening at the workmen's clubs; you will find it announced in
the remarkable list of lectures, &c., printed in certain Sunday
newspapers. The company which was exerting itself in the present
instance had at all events an appreciative audience; laughter and
applause broke forth very frequently.

'I'd forgot it was this kind o' thing to-night,' said Hewett, when he
could discover no vacant seat. 'Do you care about it? No more don't I;
let's go down into the readin'-room.'

Downstairs they established themselves at their ease. John ordered two
half-pints of ale--the club supplied refreshment for the body as well
as for the mind--and presently he was more himself.

'How's your wife?' inquired Joseph. 'Better, I hope?'

'I wish I could say so,' answered the other, shaking his head. 'She
hasn't been up since Thursday. She's bad, poor woman! she's bad.'

Joseph murmured his sympathy between two draughts of ale.

'Seen young Kirkwood lately?' Hewett asked, averting his eyes and
assuming a tone of half-absent indifference.

'He's gone away for his holiday; gone into Essex somewhere. When was it
he was speaking of you? Why, one day last week, to be sure.'

'Speakin' about me, eh?' said John, turning his glass round and round
on the table. And as the other remained silent, he added, 'You can tell
him, if you like, that my wife's been very bad for a long time. Him an'
me don't have nothing to say to each other--but you can tell him that,
if you like.'

'So I will,' replied Mr. Snowdon, nodding with a confidential air.

He had noticed from the beginning of his acquaintance with Hewett that
the latter showed no disinclination to receive news of Kirkwood. As
Clem's husband, Joseph was understood to be perfectly aware of the
state of things between the Hewetts and their former friend, and in a
recent conversation with Mrs. Hewett he had assured himself that she,
at all events, would be glad if the estrangement could come to an end.
For reasons of his own, Joseph gave narrow attention to these signs.

The talk was turning to other matters, when a man who had just entered
the room and stood looking about him with an uneasy expression caught
sight of Hewett and approached him. He was middle-aged, coarse of
feature, clad in the creased black which a certain type of a