Ern went off down Saffrons Road in the direction of Old Town, crest-fallen as is the man whose little cocoon of self-defensive humbug has suddenly been cleft by a steel blade. Joe marched away down Grove Road. Alf caught him up. The little chauffeur was smiling that curds-and-whey smile of his. "Say, Burt!--you aren't half a liar, are you?" he whispered. Joe grinned genially. "The Church can't have it all to herself," he said. "Leave a few of the lies to the laity." Ern trudged back from the Town Hall, across Saffrons Croft, to the Moot, in unenviable mood; for he was afraid, and he had cause. Ruth was who standing in the door came stalking to meet him, holding little Alice by the hand. Ern slouched up with that admixture of bluff, lordly insouciance, and aggrieved innocence that is the honoured defence of dog and man alike on such occasions. "You've done us," she said almost vengefully. "What are I done then?" asked the accused, feigning abrupt indignation. Ruth dismissed the child, and turned on Ernie. "Got us turn into the street--me and my babies," she answered, splendidly indignant. "A chap's been round arter the house, while you was up before the beaks settlin whether you were for Lewes Gaol or not. Says Alf's let it him a week from Saraday, and we got to go. I wouldn't let him in." "Ah," said Ernie stubbornly, "don't you worry. Alf's got to give us notice first. And he daren't do that." Ruth was not to be appeased. "Why daren't he, then?" she asked. "I'll tell you for why," answered Ernie. "He's goin up before the Watch Committee come Thursday to get his licence for his blessed Touring Syndicate. We've friends on that Committee, good friends--Mr. Pigott, and the Colonel, not to say Mr. Geddes; and Alf knaws it. He ain't goin to do anythink to annoy them just now. Knaws too much, Alf do." Ruth was not convinced. "We got no friends," she said sullenly. "We shall lose em all over this. O course we shall, and I don't blame em. A fair disgrace on both of you, I call it. You're lucky not to have to do a stretch. And as to Alf, they've sack him from sidesman over it, and he'll never forgive us." They were walking slowly back to the cottage, the man hang-dog, the woman cold. Outside the door she paused. "All I know is this," she said. "If you're out again through your own fault I'm done with it, and I'll tell you straight what I shall do, Ern." She was very quiet. "What then?" "I shall leave you with your children and go away with mine." She stood with heaving bosom, immensely moved. "I ca-a'nt keep the lot. But I can keep one. And you know which one that'll be." Ernie, the colour of dew, went indoors without a word. The rumour that Alf had been dismissed from his position as sidesman at St. Michael's, owing to the incident in the Goffs, was not entirely true, but there was something in it.