l*0 ANGEL PAVEMENT

"Well, I said to myself you might have been or you
might not, according to whether that clock's gone and
got fast again, and it might well have done that, the
way he's been playing about with it."

"About a quarter of an hour fast, I make it-might
be twenty minutes."

"And that/' said Mrs. Pelumpton, very decisively, "is
what comes of messing about with it. 'Leave it alone/
I told him. 'Clocks isn't in your line/ Not that quarter
of an hour's going to hurt anybody in this house—
except Edgar, and he's got his own watch with proper
railway time on it." Edgar, her son, who also lived in
the house, worked on the railway down at King's Cross.
Turgis rarely saw him.

"That's a nice bit o' meat you're having there, Mr.
Turgis, isn't it?" Mrs. Pelumpton continued, after
taking a noisy sip of tea and then staring over the cup
at him. "Chilled, that is. You'd have thought that was
English if I hadn't told you, wouldn't you?"

"Yes, I would, Mrs. Pelumpton."

"Well, I won't deceive you. It isn't. It's chilled.
And it all depends on the picking. Take what they
offer, and you don't know where you are. You've got
to look about a bit and pick it yourself. They know me
now," And here Mrs. Pelumpton produced a short
triumphant laugh. "They know me all right. Tick
where you like, Ma/ he always says to me. 'Oh, I'll "
watch it/ I tells him. Til watch it/ And I do."

"That's the style. It's a very nice dinner, Mrs.
Pelumpton."

A certain shuffling noise indicated that the master of
the house, the messer-about with clocks, Mr. Pelumpton,
was now approaching. Mr. Pelumpton moved very