en
then his hand was trembling so that I was afraid he would cut me instead
of the stitches, and I was forced to take the knife away and do it
myself. Out rolled the gold piece, a fortune in their hungry eyes; and
away we stampeded for the nearest coffee-house.

Of course I had to explain to them that I was merely an investigator, a
social student, seeking to find out how the other half lived. And at
once they shut up like clams. I was not of their kind; my speech had
changed, the tones of my voice were different, in short, I was a
superior, and they were superbly class conscious.

"What will you have?" I asked, as the waiter came for the order.

"Two slices an' a cup of tea," meekly said the Carter.

"Two slices an' a cup of tea," meekly said the Carpenter.

Stop a moment, and consider the situation. Here were two men, invited by
me into the coffee-house. They had seen my gold piece, and they could
understand that I was no pauper. One had eaten a ha'penny roll that day,
the other had eaten nothing. And they called for "two slices an' a cup
of tea!" Each man had given a tu'penny order. "Two slices," by the way,
means two slices of bread and butter.

This was the same degraded humility that had characterised their attitude
toward the poorhouse porter. But I wouldn't have it. Step by step I
increased their order--eggs, rashers of bacon, more eggs, more bacon,
more tea, more slices and so forth--they denying wistfully all the while
that they cared for anything more, and devouring it ravenously as fast as
it arrived.

"First cup o' tea I've 'ad in a fortnight," said the Carter.

"Wonderful tea, that," said the Carpenter.

They each drank two pints of it, and I assure you that it was slops. It
resembled tea less than lager beer resembles champagne. Nay, it was
"water-bewitched," and did not resemble tea at all.

It was curious, after the first shock, to notice the effect the food had
on them. At first they were melancholy, and talked of the divers times
they had contemplated suicide. The Carter, not a week before, had stood
on the bridge and looked at the water, and pondered the question. Water,
the Carpenter insisted with heat, was a bad route. He, for one, he knew,
would struggle. A bullet was "'andier," but how under the sun was he to
get hold of a revolver? That was the rub.

They grew more cheerful as the hot "tea" soaked in, and talked more about
themselves. The Carter had buried his wif