“Crowther was the sort of chap,” said the other, with deliberation, “who’d contradict anything. Never better pleased than when he was arguing that black was white. I’ve known Crowther say one thing to a girl one minute, and another the—”
The customer found his plate snatched away, the remainder of his chunk of bread swept to the floor.
“Go off out of my dining-rooms,” she ordered. “Don’t you stay here another minute, or else I may use language that I shall be sorry for afterwards, and that you’ll be sorry for afterwards. There’s your hat, hanging up just behind you. Now move, sharp!”
The sleeves of his overcoat, owing to some defect in the lining, were difficult to manage, and this gave him time to protest. He had come, he declared, with no other intention than that of giving patronage to an establishment which he remembered, with affection, in the time of Crowther’s mother, and to enjoy a talk over the past; if, in the course of conversation, he had over-stepped the mark, no one regretted it more acutely than himself. A plain man, accustomed to speaking his mind, he often found that he gave offence where none was intended.
“Jack Blunt they used to call me over at the works,” he added penitently. “Owing to me having the awk’ard trick of always telling the truth!”
Mrs. Crowther so far relented as to call the new girl; she instructed her to attend to the customer the while she herself retired to the back to wash up dishes. Mr. Hards said in a whisper to the attendant: “Don’t seem to have quite pulled it off, first go!” and Ethel, also in an undertone, replied: “Mustn’t get discouraged, uncle. Mother always says it’s your one fault. Unsettle her mind about him, that’s what you’ve got to do.”
He read a newspaper after the meal, and sent to the proprietress a deferential inquiry, asking whether he might be allowed to smoke, and presently hit upon a device for securing another interview.
“Your memory seems not quite what it ought to be,” said Mrs. Crowther, following him to the doorway. “If I were you I’d see a chemist about it.”
“I should have recollected that I hadn’t settled up,” he declared, “just about as I was coming up from the subway at Greenwich.” He found coins. “No,” gazing at a shilling reverently, “mustn’t let you have that one with the hole through it. I was told it would bring me luck. Crowther was wrong for once, but he meant well.”
“Did that really once belong to my dear husband?” she asked, with eagerness. “Oh, do let me look. I’d give almost anything to be allowed to keep it.”