"Monty, dear boy," he said solemnly, "I know 'em."
"You."
"Me," said Tuppy wagging his head wisely, "One smellin' of drink an' the other sneakin' round the corner—brokers."
Part IV
THE DUKE REMAINS
I
If I have unwittingly conveyed an impression that Brockley is without interest to the outside world I have done its credit and myself much wrong, as the talented Omar might have said. I quote Omar instinctively because of Brockley's association with the tent-maker of Ispahan. For Brockley for many years has been the Mecca of Southern London. Never a Sunday passed but little caravans of purposeful pilgrims have converged upon the Brockley Jack Arms, and producing their railway tickets or other evidence of their bona fides, have drunk beer during prohibited hours.
For years and years this pleasant and touching custom has made Brockley historical. Lambeth awaking beerless, improvident Kennington greeting the thirsty dawn, Bermondsey confronted with the dull sad hours between breakfast time and 1 p.m.—all these in singleness of purpose and with a unity of thought, said with one voice "Brockley." Suddenly a new interest came to Brockley; call it a morbid interest if you will. It was sufficient, at any rate, to divert the stream that flowed past the cemetery to the hostel beyond. Sufficient to detach the stragglers at any rate, and draw them, with perplexed faces and sceptical expressions, to the neighbourhood of Kymott Crescent.
There was a public spirited gentleman of Church Street, Deptford, whose wife worked at a jam factory. He himself spent the greater part of his life looking for work, but it never seemed to nestle in the dark interior of a quart pot, in which his searching eyes were for the greater part of the time concentrated.
This person was, by name, Haggitt, but mostly he was called Olejoe—a name suggesting a Scandinavian origin, but, as a matter of fact, quite simply derived. Despite his chronic condition of unemployment, Olejoe possessed a "guv'nor," of whom he spoke in terms of affectionate pride. Sometimes, when Olejoe would be standing in the corner of the public bar—he used the George on Tanner's Hill—within reach of the zinc counter on the one hand and the pipe spills on the other, an unshaven man would thrust his head in at the door and beckon Olejoe with a sharp impatient jerk of the head. Then Olejoe would issue hastily, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.