apsed into the clutches of black care, that perhaps prefers to sit
behind a horseman, but knows also how to tread close on the heels of
people not sufficiently well off to keep horses--like Mr Verloc, for
instance.

Winnie, at the shop door, did not see this fatal attendant upon Mr
Verloc's walks. She watched the two figures down the squalid street, one
tall and burly, the other slight and short, with a thin neck, and the
peaked shoulders raised slightly under the large semi-transparent ears.
The material of their overcoats was the same, their hats were black and
round in shape. Inspired by the similarity of wearing apparel, Mrs
Verloc gave rein to her fancy.

"Might be father and son," she said to herself. She thought also that Mr
Verloc was as much of a father as poor Stevie ever had in his life. She
was aware also that it was her work. And with peaceful pride she
congratulated herself on a certain resolution she had taken a few years
before. It had cost her some effort, and even a few tears.

She congratulated herself still more on observing in the course of days
that Mr Verloc seemed to be taking kindly to Stevie's companionship.
Now, when ready to go out for his walk, Mr Verloc called aloud to the
boy, in the spirit, no doubt, in which a man invites the attendance of
the household dog, though, of course, in a different manner. In the
house Mr Verloc could be detected staring curiously at Stevie a good
deal. His own demeanour had changed. Taciturn still, he was not so
listless. Mrs Verloc thought that he was rather jumpy at times. It
might have been regarded as an improvement. As to Stevie, he moped no
longer at the foot of the clock, but muttered to himself in corners
instead in a threatening tone. When asked "What is it you're saying,
Stevie?" he merely opened his mouth, and squinted at his sister. At odd
times he clenched his fists without apparent cause, and when discovered
in solitude would be scowling at the wall, with the sheet of paper and
the pencil given him for drawing circles lying blank and idle on the
kitchen table. This was a change, but it was no improvement. Mrs Verloc
including all these vagaries under the general definition of excitement,
began to fear that Stevie was hearing more than was good for him of her
husband's conversations with his friends. During his "walks" Mr Verloc,
of course, met and conversed with various persons. It could hardly be
otherwise. His walks were an