Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. II, 1889.djvu/167

 The talk was turning to other matters, when a man who had just entered the room and stood looking about him with an uneasy expression caught sight of Hewett and approached him. He was middle-aged, coarse of feature, clad in the creased black which a certain type of artisan wears on Sunday.

“I’d like a word with you, John,” he said, “if your friend’ll excuse.”

Hewett rose from the table, and they walked together to an unoccupied spot.

“Have you heard any talk about the Burial Club?” inquired the man, in a low voice of suspicion, knitting his eyebrows.

“Heard anything? No. What?”

“Why, Dick Smales says he can’t get the money for his boy, as died last week.”

“Can’t get it? Why not?”

“That’s just what I want to know. Some o’ the chaps is talkin’ about it upstairs. M’Cosh ain’t been seen for four or five days. Somebody had news as he was ill in bed, and now there’s no findin’ him. I’ve got a notion there’s something wrong, my boy.”