He ate mechanically, and spoke hardly
at all. Little by little, Franks felt the depressing effect of this
companionship. When they returned to the studio, to smoke by the
fireside, only a casual word broke the cheerless silence.
"I oughtn't to have come to-day," said Will, at length, half
apologetically. "I feel like a bear with a sore head. I think I'm
going."
"Shall I come and see you some evening?" asked the other in his
friendliest tone.
"No--I mean not just yet.--I'll write and ask you."
And Will went out into the frosty gloom.
CHAPTER 24
By way of Allchin, who knew all the gossip of the neighbourhood,
Warburton learnt that his new competitor in trade was a man with
five children and a wife given to drink; he had been in business in
another part of London, and was suspected to have removed with the
hope that new surroundings might help his wife to overcome her
disastrous failing. A very respectable man, people said; kind
husband, good father, honest dealer. But Allchin reported, with a
twinkle of the eye, that all his capital had gone in the new start,
and it was already clear that his business did not thrive.
"We shall starve him out!" cried the assistant, snapping his thumb
and finger.
"And what'll become of him then?" asked Will.
"Oh, that's for him to think about," replied Allchin. "Wouldn't he
starve us, if he could, sir?"
And Warburton, brooding on this matter, stood appalled at the
ferocity of the struggle amid which he lived, in which he had his
part.
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