“Yes; and I’d better bring it to Dixons’, hadn’t I?” James Thickens began to work at his smoothly-shaven face, pinching his cheeks with his long white fingers and thumb, and drawing them down to his chin, as if he wished to pare that off to a point—an unnecessary procedure, as it was already very sharp.
“I can’t do better, can I?”
The bank clerk looked sharply round the room again, his eyes lighting on the desk, books, and various ornaments, with which the manager had surrounded himself.
“I don’t know,” he said at last.
“But I don’t like keeping the money in the house, Mr Thickens. I always wake up about three, and fancy that thieves are breaking in.”
“Give it to me, then, and I’ll put it safely for you somewhere.”
“In the bank, Mr Thickens?”
“I don’t know yet,” he said. “Give me the book. Thank you. I’ll talk to you about the money another time;” and, placing the volume under his arm, he glanced once more sharply round the room, and then went off very thoughtful and strange of aspect—veritably looking, as Mrs Pinet said, as close as the safe up at Dixons’ Bank.