'No,' Rob said sadly, 'and never will.'
'I shall warn the proof-readers to be on the alert,' Mr. Rowbotham said, laughing, though Rob did not see what at. 'Dine with me at the Garrick on Wednesday week, will you?'
Rob nodded, and was retiring, when the editor called after him—
'You are not a married man, Angus?'
'No,' said Rob, with a sickly smile.
'Ah, you should marry,' recommended Mr. Rowbotham, who is a bachelor. 'You would be worth another two hundred a year to us then. I wish I could find the time to do it myself.'
Rob left the office a made man, but looking as if it all had happened some time ago. There were men shivering in Fleet Street as he passed down it who had come to London on the same day as himself, every one with a tragic story to tell now, and some already seeking the double death that is called drowning care. Shadows of university graduates passed him in the fog who would have been glad to carry his bag. That night a sandwich-board man, who had once had a thousand a year, crept into the Thames. Yet Rob bored his way home, feeling that it was all in vain.
He stopped at Abinger's door to tell him what had happened, but the chambers were locked. More like a man who had lost £800 a year than one who had just been offered it, he mounted to his own rooms, hardly noticing that the door was now ajar. The blackness of night was in the sitting-room, and a smell of burning leather.
'Another pair of slippers gone,' said a voice from the fireplace. It was Dick, and if he had not jumped out of one of the slippers he would have been on fire himself. Long experience had told him the exact moment to jump.
'I tried your door,' Rob said. 'I have news for you.'