"Have you met with the work of Stephen Cresswell?" the young woman enquired, almost solemnly.
Harvey Grimm repeated the name several times.
"For the moment——" he confessed.
"Eightpence," the girl interrupted, depositing one of the paper-covered volumes in his hand. "Perhaps your friend would like one, too. I can promise you that when you have read Cresswell's Spring Lyrics, you will find all Victorian poetry anæmic."
Harvey Grimm handed a copy to his companion, laid down two shillings and pocketed the eightpence change a little diffidently.
"You would perhaps like to look around," the young lady suggested.
She vanished into an inner room. Almost at that moment the door leading into the street was violently opened, and a young man of somewhat surprising appearance abruptly entered. He was over six feet in height, he wore a flannel shirt and collar much the worse for wear, a brown tweed coat from which every button was missing, and through an old pair of patent boots came an unashamed and very evident toe. The two visitors stared at him in amazement. The young man's eyes, from the moment of his entrance, were fixed upon the paper volume which Harvey Grimm was carrying.
"Sir," he enquired, "am I to conclude that you have purchased a copy—the copy of poems you hold in your hand?"
"I have just done so," Harvey Grimm admitted, "also my friend."
The young man pushed past him towards the inner room.