After a while he slipped from the bench involuntarily. He found himself on his knees on the cold stone floor. He clasped his hands and pressed his eyes convulsively against the piece of wood on which he had been sitting. He began to pray. There seemed to be nothing else to do.
Two hours later a police constable entered and lit a feeble gas-jet high up in the wall. It was protected by a cage of wire. He then gave a kick to the breathing, shapeless thing without a name, which lay in the middle of the stone floor.
With a leer of jocular malignity the occupant of the form pointed to the kneeling figure of the boy.
“Off his onion, mate,” he said, with a low growl and expectorating freely.
“Pity you ain’t,” said the police constable.
The occupant of the form spat upon the boots of the police constable.
The police constable approached the boy, and said, with a sort of rough kindness—
“You can have the Christian Herald, my lad, if you’d like it.”
The boy neither moved nor answered. He did not know that a word had been spoken to him.
“Told yer, cully,” came the rough growl from the form. “He’s up the pole.”