"There's someone coming along. It's a pity. I should enjoy thrashing you and then running you in. But a man of my position doesn't care to get mixed up in a street row. It wouldn't sound well at Liverpool. Stand quiet, will you!"
A man and a woman drew near, and lingered for a moment in curiosity. Hilliard already amazed at what he had done, became passive, and stood with bent head.
"I must have a word or two With you," said Dengate, when he had picked up his hat. "Can you walk straight? I didn't notice you were drunk before I spoke to you. Come along this way."
To escape the lookers-on, Hilliard moved forward.
"I've always regretted," resumed his companion, "that I didn't give you a sound thrashing that night in the train. It would have done you good. It might have been the making of you. I didn't hurt you, eh?"
"You've bruised my lips—that's all. And I deserved it for being such a damned fool as to lose my temper."
"You look rather more decent than I should have expected. What have you been doing in London?"
"How do you know I have been in London?"
"I took that for granted when I knew you'd left your work at Dudley."
"Who told you I had left it?"