Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. I, 1889.djvu/232

 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. Tubbs says she believes it’s him has tempted her away.”

She spoke the last sentences in a low voice, painfully watching their effect.

“And why hasn’t Mrs. Tubbs spoken about this before?” Sidney asked, also in a subdued voice, but without other show of agitation.

“That’s just what I said to her myself. The girl was in her charge, an’ it was her duty to let us know if things went wrong. But how am I to tell her father? I dursn’t do it, Sidney; for my life, I dursn’t! I’d go