"Got any o' the King's pictures about ye?" asked Peke.
Helmsley looked, as he felt, bewildered.
"The King's pictures?" he echoed—"You mean——?"
"This!" and Peke drew out of his tattered trouser pocket a dim and blackened sixpence—"'Ere 'e is, as large as life, a bit bald about the top o' 'is blessed old 'ead, Glory be good to 'im, but as useful as if all 'is 'air was still a blowin' an' a growin'! Aint that the King's picture, D. David? Don't it say 'Edwardus VII. D. G. Britt.,' which means Edward the Seventh, thanks be to God Britain? Don't it?"
"It do!" replied Helmsley emphatically, taking a fantastic pleasure in the bad grammar of his reply. "I've got a few more pictures of the same kind," and he took out two or three loose shillings and pennies—"Can we get a night's lodging about here for that?"
"Av coorse we can! I'll take ye to a place where ye'll be as welcome as the flowers in May with Matt Peke interroducin' of ye. Two o' them thank-God Britts in silver will set ye up wi' a plate o' wholesome food an' a clean bed at the 'Trusty Man.' It's a pub, but Miss Tranter what keeps it is an old maid, an' she's that proud o' the only 'Trusty Man' she ever 'ad that she calls it an 'Otel!"
He grinned good-humouredly at what he considered his own witticism concerning the little weakness of Miss Tranter, and proceeded to shoulder his basket.
"You aint proud, are ye?" he said, as he turned his ferret-brown eyes on Helmsley inquisitively.
Helmsley, who had, quite unconsciously to himself, drawn up his spare figure in his old habitual way of standing very erect, with that composed air of dignity and resolution which those who knew him personally in business were well accustomed to, started at the question.
"Proud!" he exclaimed—"I? What have I to be proud of? I'm the most miserable old fellow in the world, my friend! You may take my word for that! There's not a soul that cares a button whether I live or die! I'm seventy years of age—out of work, and utterly wretched and friendless! Why the devil should I be proud?"