"You'll be all right here till breakfast, sir, won't you? After that you can see the manager."
Five minutes later Dick was asleep.
A few hours later he met some of his political confrères, two of whom begged him to lodge with them.
It was not much of a place they assured him, but the best their money would run to. "Four hundred a year's very little in London, and that you'll find out before long," one of them assured him.
"Every penny has to be looked after, and by living two or three together we can do things cheaper."
After seeing their lodgings, however, Dick determined to look around for himself. He did not relish the idea of sharing apartments with others. He wanted privacy, and he felt, although, like himself, these men were "Labour Members," that he had little in common with them.
"I thought of trying to get a small, cheap flat," he said.
"Not to be thought of with our pay," was the laughing response. "Of course you being a bachelor may have saved up a bit, or it may be that you think you'll be able to make a few pounds by journalism."
"Some do it, don't they?" he asked.
"They all want to do it, that's why there's so little chance. But I hear you are a bit of a swell, been to a public school and all that kind of thing, so you may have friends at court. Done anything that way?"