I'll be previous with him in
the passage. The lame woman 'll let me. I shan't trouble her. She'll be
palliable between me and him, in case he goes for to attack me. I ain't
afraid of him.'
But, as the minutes of waiting went by, his old tongue, like that of a
dog expecting chastisement, appeared ever more frequently to moisten his
twisted, discoloured lips. 'This comes of mixin' up with soldiers,' he
thought, 'and a lowclass o' man like that. I ought to ha' changed my
lodgin's. He'll be askin' me where that young girl is, I shouldn't
wonder, an' him lost his character and his job, and everything, and all
because o' women!'
He watched the broad-faced woman, Mrs. Budgen, in whose grey eyes the
fighting light so fortunately never died, painfully doing out her rooms,
and propping herself against the chest of drawers whereon clustered
china cups and dogs as thick as toadstools on a bank.
"I've told my Charlie," she said, "to keep clear of Hughs a bit. They
comes out as prickly as hedgehogs. Pick a quarrel as soon as look at
you, they will."
'Oh dear,' thought Creed, 'she's full o' cold comfort.' But, careful of
his dignity, he answered, "I'm a-waitin' here to engage the situation.
You don't think he'll attack of me with definition at this time in the
mornin'?"
The lame woman shrugged her shoulders.
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