Sidney took a few steps in silence.

‘You don’t misunderstand me,’ resumed the other, with suddenncss.  ’You don’t think as I won’t trust her away from me.  If she went, it ’ud be because she thinks herself a burden—­as if I wouldn’t gladly live on a crust for my day’s food an’ spare her goin’ among strangers!  You can think yourself what it ’ud be to her, Sidney.  No, no, it mustn’t be nothing o’ that kind.  But I can’t ear to see her livin’ as she does; it’s no life at all.  I sit with her when I get back home at night, an’ I’m glad to say she seems to find it a pleasure to have me by her; but it’s the only bit o’ pleasure she gets, an’ there’s all the hours whilst I’m away.  You see she don’t take much to Mrs. Eagles; that ain’t her sort of friend.  Not as she’s got any pride left about her, poor girl don’t think that.  I tell you, Sidney, she’s a dear good girl to her old father.  If I could only see her a bit happier, I’d never grumble again as long as I lived, I wouldn’t!’

Is there such a thing in this world as speech that has but one simple interpretation, one for him who utters it and for him who hears?  Honester words were never spoken than these in which Hewett strove to represent Clara in a favourable light, and to show the pitifulness of her situation; yet he himself was conscious that they implied a second meaning, and Sidney was driven restlessly about the room by his perception of the same lurking motive in their pathos.  John felt half-ashamed of himself when he ceased; it was a new thing for him to be practising subtleties with a view to his own ends.  But had he said a word more than the truth?

I suppose it was the association of contrast that turned Sidney’s thoughts to Joseph Snowdon.  At all events it was of him he was thinking in the silence that followed.  Which silence having been broken by a tap at the door, oddly enough there stood Joseph himself.  Hewett, taken by surprise, showed embarrassment and awkwardness; it was always hard for him to reconcile his present subordination to Mr. Snowdon with the familiar terms on which they had been not long ago.

‘Ah, you here, Hewett!’ exclaimed Joseph, in a genial tone, designed to put the other at his ease.  ’I just wanted a word with our friend.  Never mind; some other time.’

For all that, he did not seem disposed to withdraw, but stood with a hand on the door, smiling.  Sidney, having nodded to him, walked the length of the room, his head bent and his hands behind him.

‘Suppose I look in u bit later,’ said Hewett.  ’Or tomorrow night, Sidney?’

‘Very well, to-morrow night.’

John took his leave, and on the visitor who remained Sidney turned a face almost of anger.  Mr. Snowdon seated himself, supremely indifferent to the inconvenience he had probably caused.  He seemed in excellent humour.

‘Decent fellow, Hewett,’ he observed, putting up one leg against the fireplace.  ’Very decent fellow.  He’s getting old, unfortunately.  Had a good deal of trouble, I understand; it breaks a man up.’