Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. III, 1889.djvu/224

214 doctor. They’ll have me, but I can’t help it. I feel as if I was going.”

“They shan’t take you, Bob. Oh no, they shan’t. The doctor needn’t know who you are.”

“It was a cab knocked me down, when I was running. I’m awful bad, Penny. You’ll do something for me, won’t you?”

“Oh, why didn’t you send mother for me?”

The door opened. It was Mrs. Candy who entered. She slammed the door, turned the key, and exclaimed in a low voice of alarm:

“Bob, there’s the police downstairs! They come just this minute. There’s one gone to the back-door, and there’s one talkin’ to Mrs. Hope at the front.”

“Then they’ve followed Pennyloaf,” he replied, in a tone of despair. “They’ve followed Pennyloaf.”

It was the truth. She had been watched all day, and was now tracked to Shooter’s Gardens, to this house. Mrs. Candy struck a match, and for an instant illuminated the wretched room; she looked at the two, and they at length saw each other’s faces. Then the little flame was extinguished, and a red spot marked the place where the remnant of the match lay.