ir barrels did a great deal to
intensify the hostility of her mood. On the edge of the crowd an old
man, who had been trying to force his way through it, was being guyed by
a gang of louts who had surrounded an ice-cream barrow. Suddenly she
recognized this old man. His name was Shushions; he was a familiar
figure of the streets of Turnhill, and he had the reputation of being
the oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns. He was indeed
exceedingly old, foolish, and undignified in senility; and the louts
were odiously jeering at his defenceless dotage, and a young policeman
was obviously with the louts and against the aged, fatuous victim.

Hilda gave an exclamation of revolt, and called upon Edwin Clayhanger to
go to the rescue of Mr. Shushions. Not he, however, but she jumped down
first and pushed towards the barrow. She made the path, and he followed.
She protested to the policeman, and he too modestly seconded her. Yet
the policeman, ignoring her, addressed himself to Edwin Clayhanger.
Hilda was infuriated. It appeared that old Mr. Shushions had had a
ticket for the platform, but had lost it.

"He must be got on to the platform somehow!" she decided, with a fiery
glance.

But Edwin Clayhanger seemed to be incapable of an heroic action. He
hesitated. The policeman hesitated. Fortunately, the plight of the
doting oldest Sunday School teacher in the Five Towns had been observed
from the platform, and two fussy, rosetted officials bustled up and
offered to take charge of him. And Hilda, dissolving in painful pity,
bent over him softly and arranged his disordered clothes; she was
weeping.

"Shall we go back to our barrels?" Edwin Clayhanger rather sheepishly
suggested after Mr. Shushions had been dragged away.

But she would not go back to the barrels.

"I think it's time we set about to find Janet and Mr. Orgreave," she
replied coldly, and they drew out of the crowd. She was profoundly
deceived in Edwin Clayhanger, so famous for his presence of mind in
saving printing-shops from destruction! She did not know what he ought
to have done; she made no attempt to conceive what he ought to have
done. But that he ought to have done something--something decisive and
grandly masculine--she was sure.

V

Later, after sundry adventures, and having found Mr. Orgreave and Janet,
they stood at the tail of the steam-car, which Janet had decided should
carry her up to Bleakridge; and Edwin shook hands. Yes, Hilda was
p