She did not, however, thrust her bared arm into the water this time.  No!  Roger, who never cried before his bath, was crying, was indubitably crying.  And he cried louder and louder.

’Stand where he can’t see you, dearest.  He isn’t used to you at bath-time,’ said Mrs Blackshaw still coldly.  ’Are you, my pet?  There!  There!’

Mr Blackshaw effaced himself, feeling a fool.  But Roger continued to cry.  He cried himself purple.  He cried till the veins stood out on his forehead and his mouth was like a map of Australia.  He cried himself into a monster of ugliness.  Neither mother nor nurse could do anything with him at all.

‘I think you’ve upset him, dearest,’ said Mrs Blackshaw even more coldly.  ‘Hadn’t you better go?’

‘Well—­’ protested the father.

‘I think you had better go,’ said Mrs Blackshaw, adding no term of endearment, and visibly controlling herself with difficulty.

And Mr Blackshaw went.  He had to go.  He went out into the unelectric night.  He headed for the Works, not because he cared twopence, at that moment, about the accident at the Works, whatever it was; but simply because the Works was the only place to go to.  And even outside in the dark street he could hear the rousing accents of his progeny.

People were talking to each other as they groped about in the road, and either making jokes at the expense of the new Electricity Department, or frankly cursing it with true Five Towns directness of speech.  And as Mr Blackshaw went down the hill into the town his heart was as black as the street itself with rage and disappointment.  He had made his child cry!

Someone stopped him.

‘Eh, Mester Blackshaw!’ said a voice, and under the voice a hand struck a match to light a pipe.  ‘What’s th’ maning o’ this eclipse as you’m treating us to?’

Mr Blackshaw looked right through the inquirer—­a way he had when his brain was working hard.  And he suddenly smiled by the light of the match.

‘That child wasn’t crying because I was there,’ said Mr Blackshaw with solemn relief.  ’Not at all!  He was crying because he didn’t understand the candles.  He isn’t used to candles, and they frightened him.’

And he began to hurry towards the Works.

At the same instant the electric light returned to Bursley.  The current was resumed.

‘That’s better,’ said Mr Blackshaw, sighing.

THE SILENT BROTHERS

I

John and Robert Hessian, brothers, bachelors, and dressed in mourning, sat together after supper in the parlour of their house at the bottom of Oldcastle Street, Bursley.  Maggie, the middle-aged servant, was clearing the table.

‘Leave the cloth and the coffee,’ said John, the elder, ’Mr Liversage is coming in.’

‘Yes, Mr John,’ said Maggie.