e of repair, while Crass stood by, white and
trembling, watching the proceedings but lacking the courage to
interfere.

'Now go to the office and ask Rushton for 'em, if you like!' shouted
Sawkins. 'You can 'ave 'em now, if you want 'em.'

Crass made no answer and, after a moment's hesitation, went back to his
work, and Sawkins piled the things on the cart once more and took them
away to the Destructor. He would not be able to sell them now, but at
any rate he had stopped that dirty swine Crass from getting them.

When Crass went back to the paint-shop he found there one of the
pillows which had fallen out of the bundle during the struggle. He
took it home with him that evening and slept upon it. It was a fine
pillow, much fuller and softer and more cosy than the one he had been
accustomed to.

A few days afterwards when he was working at the room where the woman
died, they gave him some other things that had belonged to her to do
away with, and amongst them was a kind of wrap of grey knitted wool.
Crass kept this for himself: it was just the thing to wrap round one's
neck when going to work on a cold morning, and he used it for that
purpose all through the winter. In addition to the funerals, there was
a little other work: sometimes a room or two to be painted and papered
and ceilings whitened, and once they had the outside of two small
cottages to paint--doors and windows--two coats. All four of them
worked at this job and it was finished in two days. And so they went
on.

Some weeks Crass earned a pound or eighteen shillings; sometimes a
little more, generally less and occasionally nothing at all.

There was a lot of jealousy and ill-feeling amongst them about the
work. Slyme and Crass were both aggrieved about Sawkins whenever they
were idle, especially if the latter were painting or whitewashing, and
their indignation was shared by all the others who were 'off'. Harlow
swore horribly about it, and they all agreed that it was disgraceful
that a bloody labourer should be employed doing what ought to be
skilled work for fivepence an hour, while properly qualified men were
'walking about'. These other men were also incensed against Slyme and
Crass because the latter were given the preference whenever there was a
little job to do, and it was darkly insinuated that in order to secure
this preference these two were working for sixpence an hour. There was
no love lost between Crass and Slyme either: Crass