in't movin', is 'e, mum?"

"The van contains a presentation of carved-oak dining-room furniture,"
she added.

"An' very nice too," was Bindle's comment.

"Outside Downing Street," she continued, "you will be met by a lady
who will give you the key that opens the doors of the van."

"'Adn't we better take the key now, mum?" Bindle enquired.

"You'll do as you're told, please," was the uncompromising rejoinder.

"Right-o! mum," remarked Bindle cheerily. "Now then, Tippy, let's get
these 'ere 'orses in. Which end d'you begin on?"

Tippitt and Bindle silently busied themselves in harnessing the horses
to the pantechnicon.

"Now you won't make any mistake," said the lady when everything was
completed. "Number 110, Downing Street, Mr. Llewellyn John."

"There ain't goin' to be no mistakes, mum, you may put your 'and on
your 'eart," Bindle assured her.

"Cawfee money, mum?" enquired Tippitt. "It's 'ot." Tippitt never
wasted words.

"Tippy, Tippy! I'm surprised at you!" Bindle turned upon his colleague
reproachfully. "Only twice 'ave you spoke to-day, an' the second
time's to beg. I'm sorry, mum," he said, turning to the lady. "It
ain't 'is fault. It's jest 'abit."

The lady hesitated for a moment, then taking her purse from her bag,
handed Bindle a two-shilling piece.

Tippitt eyed it greedily.

With a final admonition not to forget, the lady drove off.

Bindle looked at the coin, spat on it, and put it in his pocket.

"Funny thing 'ow a woman'll give a couple o' bob, where a man'll make
it 'alf a dollar," he remarked.

"Wot about me?" enquired Tippitt.

"Wot about you, Tippy?" repeated Bindle. "Well, least said soonest
mended. You can't 'elp it."

"But I asked 'er," persisted Tippitt.

"Ah! Tippy," remarked Bindle, "it ain't 'im wot asks; but 'im wot
gets. 'Owever, you shall 'ave a stone-ginger at the next stoppin'
place. Your ole pal ain't goin' back on you, Tippy."

Without a word, Tippitt climbed up into the driver's seat, whilst
Bindle clambered on to the tail-board, where he proceeded to fill his
pipe with the air of a man for whom time has no meaning.

"Good job they ain't all like me," he muttered. "I likes a day in the
country, now _and_ then; but always! Not me." He struck a match,
lighted his pipe and, with a sigh of contentment, composed himself to
bucolic meditation.

One of the advantages of the moving-profession in Bindle's eyes was
that it gave him hours of leisured ease, whilst th