This etext was transcribed by Les Bowler
BY
W. PETT RIDGE
AUTHOR OF “MORD EM’LY,”ETC.
METHUEN AND CO.
36, ESSEX STREET, W.C.
LONDON
1902
The round white September moonlighted up Pitfield Street from end to end, making the gas lightsin the shop windows look abashed and unnecessary; out in the OldStreet triangle, men on the wooden seats who had good eyesightread halfpenny evening papers as though it were day, able withouttrouble to make record in knowing-looking pocket-books of therunning of Ormonde. At the Hoxton Theatre of Varieties, theearly crowd streamed out into Pitfield Street flushed with twohours of joy for twopence, and the late crowd which had beenwaiting patiently for some time at the doors, flowed in. When these two crowds had disappeared, the Old Street end ofPitfield Street belonged once more to the men and women who wereshopping, and at the obtrusive fruiterer’s (with a shopthat bulged almost to the kerb and a wife whose size was reallybeyond all reason), even there one could just pass withoutstepping into the road. Further up the street, outside apublic-house, was, however, another crowd blocking the pathway,and this crowd overflowed into the dim passage by the side of thepublic-house, where it looked up at a lighted room on the firstfloor with an interest ungenerously repaid by the back view of afew heads. A grown-up crowd, mainly of middle-agedwomen. Children had given up efforts to belong to it, anddown the passage, which was as the neck of a bottle leading intoa court quite six feet wide, youngsters shouted and sang andquarrelled and played at games. From the direction of theother end came a short acute-faced boy with a peakless cap, aworn red scarf tied very tightly around his neck. He hadboth hands in the pockets of a jacket which was too large forhim; he smoked the fag-end of a cigar with the frowning air of aconnoisseur who is not altogether well pleased with thebrand. He stopped, signalled with a jerk of his head to aslip of a girl who was disputing for the possession of an emptylobster can, with the vigour that could not have been exceeded ifthe lobster can had been a jewel case of priceless value; sheretired at once from the struggle, and, pulling at her stocking,ran towards him.
“Where’s all the chaps?” he asked, removingthe cigar stump from his lips.
“Where’ve you bin, Bobbie Lancaster?” sheasked, without replying to his question.
p.2“You ’eard what I asted you, Trix,” hesaid, steadily. “I asted you where all the chapswas.”
“Some of ’em have gone over ’Ackneyway,” said the slip of a girl. “Where’veyou bin?”
He flicked the black ash from the fag end in the manner of onefive times his age.
“’Opping!” he said.
“You’re a liar!” retorted the small girl,sharply.
“Ho!” said the boy. “Shows what youknow about it.”
“No, but,” she said, admiringly, “’aveyou though, straight?”
“I’ve bin at Yaldin’,” he said, withimmeasurable importance,—“at Yaldin’ down inKent for ite days. Me and another chap.”
“Bin ’ome?” asked the girl, withinterest.
“Not yet,” he said. “When I do I shall’ave to take a drop of something in for the old gel. I went off wifout letting her know and I expect she’s beenwonderin’ what’s become of me.”
“Then if you ain’t bin ’ome,” said thelittle