t, if I had married her,
have become tired of my new _role_, and drifted? Well, if I had I should
have dragged her with me. Did I really love her? Did I not love myself
all the time? It was not of her I thought. It was all of my miserable,
sordid little self. Still, if there is an Almighty, He made a mistake in
treating me so! But there, as though an Almighty cared about such as I.
If He does, He regards us all as a part of a grim joke."

"I'nt got a bit a bacca on yer, 'ave yer, guv'nor?"

A man rose from a seat as he spoke, and shivered. At the other end of
the seat lay a woman asleep.

"I cawn't sleep, I'm so bloomin' cold," went on the man, "and I'm just
dyin' for a bit a bacca."

"Why do you try to sleep here?" asked Leicester.

"'Cause I in't got no weers else, guv'nor. That's why. Besides, my
hinsides is empty, and yer cawn't sleep when yer empty. Tell yer, I'm
fair sick on it."

"Why don't you make an end of it?"

"Wot yer mean?"

Leicester pointed to the river.

"Would for tuppence," said the man.

Leicester put his hand in his pocket and took out the first coin he
felt. It was a two-shilling piece.

"Here's a dozen tuppences," he said; "now let's see if you've got the
pluck."

The man snatched at the coin, examined it in the light of the lamp, and
spat on it. Then he went to the woman and shook her.

"Cum on, Mord," he said.

"Weer?" said the woman sleepily.

"Daan ter ole Jerry's doss-aas."

"We cawn't; we in't got fo'pence."

"Yus, we 'as; a swell hev chucked me two bob. Cum on."

The woman rose and prepared to follow the man.

"But you told me----"

"That I'd do it for tuppence, but not fer two bob, guv'nor. Goo'-night,
and thenk yer."

Leicester laughed. He had not expected the man to throw himself into the
river; indeed, had he attempted it, he would most likely have stopped
him; but he laughed all the same. Two shillings meant food and a warm
place to lie, and the tramp clung to life.

"We are all such cowards," he said, as he walked on towards Blackfriars
Bridge. The great space outside Blackfriars underground railway station
was empty. Not a soul was to be seen. He crossed to the road at the end
of the bridge, and stood at the top of the steps which led down to the
river.

"I'll look at it closer," he said. "It'll be fun to stand and watch the
dirty stuff sweep on to the sea."

He went down the granite steps which led to the river, and crept under
the barrier that was