“I shan’t want no money back from you at all, Joe,” interrupted Mr. Dobb, coldly, “because I shan’t let you ’ave none to begin with. I shouldn’t dream of it!”
“Well, of all the mean, ’ard-’earted, un’elpful, false friends—” exclaimed Mr. Tridge, in high vexation.
“You go into the shop there, Joe,” directed Mr. Dobb, “and you’ll see my motter ’ung up large on the wall. ‘Strictly Business!’—that’s my guiding princerple, and you knows it! Business is business, and friendship is friendship, and when you tries to mix ’em you gets a little of each and not enough of both.”
“But lending me twenty quid to start on my own with would be business,” contended Mr. Tridge. “I’d pay you back.”
“I dare say you would,” retorted Mr. Dobb, sceptically. “If you could. But s’pose the speckylation turned out a failure, eh? No, Joe, I ain’t going to risk my money, and there’s a end to it. Or, rather, there won’t be a end of it. And now let’s change the subject and talk about something hinteresting.”
“But—but—but,” spluttered Mr. Tridge, wrathfully, “it was you what made me lose all my time learning ’air-dressing! Cut and cut old Sam Clark’s ’air, I did, till it looked as if ’is ’ead ’ad been varnished! Practised clean shaving on Peter Lock till ’is chin was so sore ’e ’ad to grow a beard! It was you that was going to get me settled as a ’air-dresser, you remember?” he sneered.
“Yes, I remember,” confessed Mr. Dobb, flushing a little at the recollection. “Oh, well, mistakes will ’appen,” he put forward, with an effort to be casual.
“Mistakes did ’appen,” amended Mr. Tridge. “And ’ere am I with the old ‘Jane Gladys’ sold from under me, and me the only one of ’er crew out of a job. There’s Peter Lock in a snug billet, there’s old Sam a-ferrying fit to bust ’isself all day, there’s you married to a widow and ’er second-’and shop, and only me left out in the cold!”
“Well, and I want to see you settled,” declared Mr. Dobb. “When the four of us are well spaced about Shore’aven, we’ll be able to work some fine deals, bigger than ever we dreamed of on the old ‘Jane Gladys.’”
“Then why don’t you ’elp me to settle?” demanded Mr. Tridge, not unreasonably.