ge as a residential suburb. It had also been predicted that
even Hanbridge men would come to live at Bleakridge now. Land was
changing owners at Bleakridge, and rising in price. Complete streets of
lobbied cottages grew at angles from the main road with the rapidity of
that plant which pushes out strangling branches more quickly than a man
can run. And these lobbied cottages were at once occupied.
Cottage-property in the centre of the town depreciated.

The land fronting the main road was destined not for cottages, but for
residences, semi-detached or detached. Osmond Orgreave had a good deal
of this land under his control. He did not own it, he hawked it. Like
all provincial, and most London, architects, he was a land-broker in
addition to being an architect. Before obtaining a commission to build
a house, he frequently had to create the commission himself by selling a
convenient plot, and then persuading the purchaser that if he wished to
retain the respect of the community he must put on the plot a house
worthy of the plot. The Orgreave family all had expensive tastes, and
it was Osmond Orgreave's task to find most of the money needed for the
satisfaction of those tastes. He always did find it, because the
necessity was upon him, but he did not always find it easily. Janet
would say sometimes, "We mustn't be so hard on father this month;
really, lately we've never seen him with his cheque-book out of his
hand." Undoubtedly the clothes on Janet's back were partly responsible
for the celerity with which building land at Bleakridge was `developed,'
just after the installation of steam-cars in Trafalgar Road.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

TWO.

Mr Orgreave sold a corner plot to Darius. He had had his eye on Darius
for a long time before he actually shot him down; but difficulties
connected with the paring of estimates for printing had somewhat
estranged them. Orgreave had had to smooth out these difficulties,
offer to provide a portion of the purchase money on mortgage from
another client, produce a plan for a new house that surpassed all
records of cheapness, produce a plan for the transforming of Darius's
present residence into business premises, talk poetically about the
future of printing in the Five Towns, and lastly, demonstrate by digits
that Darius would actually save money by becoming a property-owner--he
had had to do all this, and more, before Dariu