There was a sense of indecent exposure, from so many backs. He felt
himself almost in physical contact with this contiguous stretch of back
premises. He heard the familiar sound of water gushing from the sink in
to the grate, the dropping of a pail outside the door, the clink of a
coal shovel, the banging of a door, the sound of voices. So many houses
cheek by jowl, so many squirming lives, so many back yards, back doors
giving on to the night. It was revolting.

Away in the street itself, a boy was calling the newspaper: "--'NING
POST! --'NING PO-O-ST!" It was a long, melancholy howl, and seemed
to epitomise the whole of the dark, wet, secretive, thickly-inhabited
night. A figure passed the window of Aaron's own house, entered, and
stood inside the room talking to Mrs. Sisson. It was a young woman in
a brown mackintosh and a black hat. She stood under the incandescent
light, and her hat nearly knocked the globe. Next door a man had run out
in his shirt sleeves: this time a young, dark-headed collier running to
the gate for a newspaper, running bare-headed, coatless, slippered in
the rain. He had got his news-sheet, and was returning. And just at that
moment the young man's wife came out, shading her candle with a lading
tin. She was going to the coal-house for some coal. Her husband passed
her on the threshold. She could be heard breaking the bits of coal and
placing them on the dustpan. The light from her candle fell faintly
behind her. Then she went back, blown by a swirl of wind. But again she
was at the door, hastily standing her iron shovel against the wall. Then
she shut the back door with a bang. These noises seemed to scrape and
strike the night.

In Aaron's own house, the young person was still talking to Mrs. Sisson.
Millicent came out, sheltering a candle with her hand. The candle blew
out. She ran indoors, and emerged again, her white pinafore fluttering.
This time she performed her little journey safely. He could see the
faint glimmer of her candle emerging secretly from the closet.

The young person was taking her leave. He could hear her
sympathetic--"Well--good night! I hope she'll be no worse. Good night
Mrs. Sisson!" She was gone--he heard the windy bang of the street-gate.
Presently Millicent emerged again, flitting indoors.

So he rose to his feet, balancing, swaying a little before he started
into motion, as so many colliers do. Then he moved along the path
towards the house, in the rain and dar