“Sit down, Mr. Bamforth, sit down. Come to the fire. Your son, sir? Pleased to know you, sir. A chip of the old block, Mr. Bamforth, a chip of the old block.”
And my father actually looked pleased, tho’ if I were a chip of the old block there was a deal more chip than block.
Mr. Blackburn was in, and presently we were ushered into an inner room. It would have turned my mother sick to see the dust that lay about, and the frosted windows that gave on to the New Street looked as if they hadn’t been washed for a century.
Mr. Blackburn shook us both by the hand in a jerky way, and offered my father a pinch of snuff from a big silver box. My father took a pinch with the result that he never ceased sneezing till we were out into the street and he had hurried to the Boot and Shoe and drunk a pint of ale to wash the tickling out of his throat.
“And now, Mr. Bamforth, what can I do for you?” asked Mr. Blackburn, pushing his spectacles on to his brow and laying a large brown silk handkerchief, snuff coloured, over his knee.
“It’s about George Mellor, yo know,” said my father.
Mr. Blackburn did not look as if he did know.
“Him ’at’s ta’en for Horsfall’s job, yo’ know,” explained my father.
“Well, what of him?”
“He’s my nevvy, yo’ know.”