e would find work for him. To Ackroyd he could not go; that would
be the same as telling Lydia, for he could trust no one in the state of
mind which he had reached; even to strangers he was afraid to appeal
with overmuch earnestness, lest stories should get about. Still an odd
shilling came to him now and then. Poor old fellow, he did sad things.
One morning he took the old blacking-brushes which he had used for
years for his one boot, and a little pot of blacking, and an old box,
and walked far away across the river, to a place where no one could
know him, and there tried to earn a little by rivalling with the
shoeblacks. It was useless; in three days he had earned but as many
pence; he could not waste time thus. It was a terrible moment when he
had first to tell Mrs. Bower that he could not discharge his due to
her. He tried to put on a half-jesting air, to make out that his
difficulty was of the most passing kind. Mrs. Bower ungraciously bade
him not to trouble himself, to pay as soon as he could. But when the
second day of default came, the landlady was even less gracious.

'I ain't an unreasonable woman, Mr. Boddy,' she said, 'and nobody could
never say I was. But then I've a 'ome to keep up, as you know. Isn't it
time as you thought things over a bit? I dessay there's them as 'll see
you don't want, if only you'll speak a word. I don't want to be
disagreeable to a old lodger, but then reason _is_ reason, ain't it?'

That Saturday night hunger drove him out. He stumped painfully into the
busy region on the south side of London Bridge, and there, at midnight,
he succeeded in begging a handful of fried potatoes from a fish-shop
that was just closing. It was all he could do, after a dozen vain
efforts to earn a copper.

But, when he got home in the early morning, a strange thing had
happened. On his table lay half a loaf of bread, a piece of butter, and
some tea twisted up in paper. How came these things here? He was in
anguish lest Lydia had left them, lest Lydia had somehow discovered his
condition and had come in his absence.

But it was not so. Lydia came, as usual, on Sunday afternoon, and
clearly knew nothing of that gift. He had eaten, and was able once more
to talk so cheerfully--in his great relief--that the girl went away
happy in the thought that he had got over a turn of ill-health. They
had talked, as always, of Thyrza. With Thyrza it was well, outwardly at
all events; Lydia had just seen her, and coul