"It's a shame," broke out the woman wildly, but her sentences were overlaid with unwomanly words, "they all does it. I ask now, how's we to get coal at all if we don't get the leavings. Jim only does what they all does. What's 'arf a pail of coal to 'im? I'd like to talk to 'un, I would. Jim will go mad again, and I've three of 'un now to think of, the brats." She flung up her arms with a superbly helpless gesture and stumbled off down the road. Christopher looked after her with a white face. "What does it mean?" he asked. "The men have a way of appropriating the remains of the last measure of coal they put on before going off duty. It's wrong of course: it's been going on for ages. I warned Scott--he's the foreman. They've been complaining about the coal supply at headquarters. Mr. Masters caught Jim Lawrie at it to-day as we left the big engine-room." "Is it a first offence?" "There's no first offence here," returned Fulner grimly. "There's one only. There's the club room. We have to pay L20 a year rent for the ground and then to keep it going." "But surely, Mr. Masters----" began Christopher and stopped. "Mr. Masters has nothing to do with the place outside the works. It is not part of the System. He pays 6d. a head more than any other employer and that frees him. There's the station." He paused as if he would leave his companion to make his way on alone. He was obviously dissatisfied and uneasy. "Won't you come to the station with me?" Christopher asked, and as they walked he began to speak slowly and hesitatingly, as one who must choose from words that were on the verge of overflowing. "I was brought up in Lambeth, Mr. Fulner. I am used to poverty and bad sights. Don't go on thinking I don't care. These people earn fortunes beside those I have known, but in all London I've never seen anything so horrible as this, nothing so hideous, sordid--" he stopped with a gasp, "the women--the children--the lost desire--the ugliness." They walked on silently. Presently he spoke again. "You are a plucky man, Mr. Fulner. I couldn't face it." "I've no choice. I don't know why I showed you it, except I thought you were coming and I wanted your help." "Are there many who care?" "No. It's too precarious. Mr. Masters doesn't approve of fools. Mind you, the men have no grievances inside the works. The unions have no chance now. It's fair to remember that." "Is it the same everywhere?" "The System's the same. I know nothing about the other works but that. There's the train: we must hurry." "What do you want for your club?" Christopher asked as he entered his carriage. "A billiard table, gym fittings, books. We've a license. We sell beer to members," his eyes were eager: the man's heart was in his hopeless self-imposed work. Christopher nodded. "I shall not forget." So they parted: each wondering over the other--would have wondered still more if they had known in what relationship they would stand to each other when they next met.