back.'

He held, however, his trowel in one hand, ready for immediate action in
case of interruption.

Philpot was about fifty-five years old. He wore no white jacket, only
an old patched apron; his trousers were old, very soiled with paint and
ragged at the bottoms of the legs where they fell over the
much-patched, broken and down-at-heel boots. The part of his waistcoat
not protected by his apron was covered with spots of dried paint. He
wore a coloured shirt and a 'dickey' which was very soiled and covered
with splashes of paint, and one side of it was projecting from the
opening of the waistcoat. His head was covered with an old cap, heavy
and shining with paint. He was very thin and stooped slightly.
Although he was really only fifty-five, he looked much older, for he
was prematurely aged.

He had not been getting his own back for quite five minutes when Hunter
softly turned the handle of the lock. Philpot immediately put out his
pipe and descending from his perch opened the door. When Hunter
entered Philpot closed it again and, mounting the steps, went on
stripping the wall just above. Nimrod looked at him suspiciously,
wondering why the door had been closed. He looked all round the room
but could see nothing to complain of. He sniffed the air to try if he
could detect the odour of tobacco, and if he had not been suffering a
cold in the head there is no doubt that he would have perceived it.
However, as it was he could smell nothing but all the same he was not
quite satisfied, although he remembered that Crass always gave Philpot
a good character.

'I don't like to have men working on a job like this with the door
shut,' he said at length. 'It always gives me the idear that the man's
'avin a mike. You can do what you're doin' just as well with the door
open.'

Philpot, muttering something about it being all the same to him--shut
or open--got down from the steps and opened the door. Hunter went out
again without making any further remark and once more began crawling
over the house.

Owen was working by himself in a room on the same floor as Philpot. He
was at the window, burning off with a paraffin torch-lamp those parts
of the old paintwork that were blistered and cracked.

In this work the flame of the lamp is directed against the old paint,
which becomes soft and is removed with a chisel knife, or a scraper
called a shavehook. The door was ajar and he had opened the top sash
of the window