"A long way from here. Bill said he knew a place where it would be quite safe. I was to say that my mistress left it to me; he said that would be sufficient.... It was in the Mile End Road." "You'd know the shop again?" said William. "But she's got the ticket," said Esther. "No, I ain't got the ticket; Bill has it." "Then I'm afraid the game's up." "Do be quiet," said Esther, angrily. "If you want to get out of lending the money say so and have done with it." "That's not true, Esther. If you want another thirty to pay him to give up the ticket, you can have it." Esther thanked her husband with one quick look. "I'm sorry," she said, "my temper is that hasty. But you know where he lives," she said, turning to the wretched woman who sat on the sofa pale and trembling. "Yes, I know where he lives--13 Milward Square, Mile End Road." "Then we've no time to lose; we must go after him at once." "No, William dear; you must not; you'd only lose your temper, and he might do you an injury." "An injury! I'd soon show him which was the best man of the two." "I'll not hear of it, Sarah. He mustn't go with you." "Come, Esther, don't be foolish. Let me go." He had taken his hat from the peg. Esther got between him and the door. "I forbid it," she said; "I will not let you go--perhaps to have a fight, and with that cough." William was coughing. He had turned pale, and he said, leaning against the table, "Give me something to drink, a little milk." Esther poured some into a cup. He sipped it slowly. "I'll go upstairs," she said, "for my hat and jacket. You've got your betting to attend to." William smiled. "Sarah, mind, he's not to go with you." "You forget what you said last night about the betting." "Never mind what I said last night about the betting; what I say now is that you're not to leave the bar. Come upstairs, Sarah, and dress yourself, and let's be off." Stack and Journeyman were waiting to speak to him. They had lost heavily over old Ben and didn't know how they'd pull through; and the whole neighbourhood was in the same plight; the bar was filled with gloomy faces. And as William scanned their disconcerted faces--clerks, hair-dressers, waiters from the innumerable eating houses--he could not help thinking that perhaps more than one of them had taken money that did not belong to them to back Ben Jonson. The unexpected disaster had upset all their plans, and even the wary ones who had a little reserve fund could not help backing outsiders, hoping by the longer odds to retrieve yesterday's losses. At two the bar was empty, and William waited for Esther and Sarah to return from Mile End. It seemed to him that they were a long time away. But Mile End is not close to Soho; and when they returned, between four and five, he saw at once that they had been unsuccessful. He lifted up the flap in the counter and all three went into the parlour.