A fly buzzed loudly against the grimy window, and by one of
those associations which time and change cannot affect, he mused
himself back into boyhood. The glimpse before him of St. John's Arch
aided the revival of old impressions; his hand ceased from its
mechanical activity, and he was absorbed in a waking dream, when a
voice called to him and said that he was wanted. He went down to the
entrance, and there found Mrs. Hewett. Her coming at all was enough
to signal some disaster, and the trouble on her face caused Sidney
to regard her with silent interrogation.
'I couldn't help comin' to you,' she began, gazing at him fixedly.
'I know you can't do anything, but I had to speak to somebody, an' I
know nobody better than you. It's about Clara.'
'What about her?'
'She's left Mrs. Tubbs. They had words about Bank-holiday last
night, an' Clara went off at once. Mrs. Tubbs thought she'd come
'ome, but this mornin' her box was sent for, an' it was to be took
to a house in Islington. An' then Mrs. Tubbs came an' told me. An'
there's worse than that, Sidney. She's been goin' about to the
theatre an' such places with a man as she got to know at the bar,
an' Mrs.
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