He put down two pounds on the table and broke off in sudden amazement as Mr. Prout, snatching up the money, bolted headlong from the room.  His surprise was shared by his son, but the other two made no sign.  Mr. Carter was now prepared for the worst, and his voice was quite calm as he gave instructions for the payment of the other three gentlemen who presented claims during the evening endorsed by Miss Evans.  As the last departed Mr. Evans, whose temper had been gradually getting beyond his control, crossed over and handed him his watch and chain, a few coppers, and the return half of his railway ticket.

“I think we can do without you, after all,” he said, breathing thickly.  “I’ve no doubt you owe money all over England.  You’re a cadger, that’s what you are.”

He pointed to the door, and Mr. Carter, after twice opening his lips to speak and failing, blundered towards it.  Miss Evans watched him curiously.

“Cheats never prosper,” she said, with gentle severity.

“Good-by,” said Mr. Carter, pausing at the door.

“It’s your own fault,” continued Miss Evans, who was suffering from a slight touch of conscience.  “If you hadn’t come here pretending to be Bert Simmons and calling me ‘Nan’ as if you had known me all my life, I wouldn’t have done it.”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Mr. Carter.  “I wish I was Bert Simmons, that’s all.  Good-by.”

“Wish you was!” said Mr. Evans, who had been listening in open-mouthed astonishment.  “Look here!  Man to man—­are you Bert Simmons or are you not?”

“No,” said Mr. Carter.

“Of course not,” said Nancy.

“And you didn’t owe that money?”

“Nobody owed it,” said Nancy.  “It was done just to punish him.”

Mr. Evans, with a strange cry, blundered towards the door.  “I’ll have that money out of ’em,” he roared, “if I have to hold ’em up and shake it out of their trouser-pockets.  You stay here.”

He hurried up the road, and Jim, with the set face of a man going into action against heavy odds, followed him.

“Your father told me to stay,” said Mr. Carter, coming farther into the room.

Nancy looked up at him through her eyelashes.  “You need not unless you want to,” she said, very softly.