They went out into the babel of the street, and, deafened by the cries of the hawkers, elbowed by panic-stricken men who fancied that if they were somewhere else they might save their hoards, shouldered by stout countrymen, adrift in the confusion like hulks in a strange sea, they made their way into Bishopsgate Street. Here they found the hackney-coach awaiting them, and drove by London Wall to the Bull and Mouth. A Birmingham coach was due to start at three, and after a gloomy wrangle they booked places by it, and, while the officer guarded the money, they sat down in the Coffee Room to a rare sirloin and a foaming tankard. They ate and drank in unfriendly silence, two empty chairs intervening; and more than once Arthur repented of his decision. But already the force of circumstances was driving them together, for the thoughts of each had travelled forward to Aldersbury—and to Ovington’s. What was happening there? What might not already have happened there? Hurried feet ran by on the pavement. Ominous words blew in at the windows. Scared men rushed in with pallid, sweating faces, ate standing and went out again. Other men sat listless, staring at the table before them, eating nothing, or here and there, apart in corners whispered curses over their meat. CHAPTER XXXVI The news of the failures which convulsed the City on that Black Monday did not reach Aldersbury until late on the Tuesday—the tidings came in with the mails. But hours before that, and even before the opening of the bank, things in the town had come to a climax. The women, always more practical than the men and less squeamish, had taken fright and been talking. In many a back parlor in Maerdol, and the Foregate, and on the Cop, wives had spoken their minds. They wouldn’t be scared out of asking for their own, by any banker that ever lived, they said. Not they! “Would you, Mrs. Gittins?” quoth one. “Not I, ma’am, if I had it to ask for, as your goodman has. I’d not sleep another night before I had it tight and right.” “No more he shall! What, rob his children for fear of a stuffy old man’s black looks? But I’ll see him into the bank myself, and see that he brings it out, too! I’ll answer for that!” “And you’re in the right, ma’am, seeing it’s yours. Money’s not that easy got we’re to be robbed of it. Now those notes with CO. on them they’re money anyways, I suppose? There’s nothing can alter them, I’m thinking. I’ve two of them at home, that my lad——” “Oh, Mrs. Gittins!” And superior information raised its hands in horror. “You understand nothing at all. Don’t you know they’re the worst of all? If those shutters—go—up at that bank,” dramatically, “they’ll not be worth the paper they’re printed on! You take my advice and go this very minute and buy something at Purslow’s or Bowdler’s, and get them changed. And you’ll thank me for that word, Mrs. Gittins, as long as you live.”