"New clipped and bright at the edges!" the bookseller answered. "Now go, my man, and be thankful I don't send for a constable." At that I shrank away, two or three of the customers coming to the door to see me out, and watching which way I turned. This, I suppose--though I was then, and for a little time longer in doubt about him--was the reason why I could see nothing of my charitable friend, when I returned to the place where I had left him. I looked this way and that, but he was gone; and though, not knowing what else to do, and having still the guinea in my possession, I lingered about the mouth of the court for an hour or more, looking for him, he did not return. At the end of that time the meagre dry man whom I had seen in the shop passed with a book under his arm; and seeing me, after a moment's hesitation stood and spoke to me. "Well, my friend?" said he, looking hard at me. "Are you waiting for the halter?" I told him civilly, no; but that the gentleman who had given me the guinea to change had bidden me return to him there. "And he is not here?" he said with a sneer. "No," I said. He stared at me, wondering at the simplicity of my answer; and then, "Well, you are either the biggest fool or the biggest knave within the bills!" he exclaimed. "Are you straight from Gotham?" "No," I told him. "From the north." And that I wanted employment. "You are like to get it--at the Plantations!" he answered savagely, taking snuff. I remarked that neither his hands nor his linen were of the cleanest, and that the former were stained with ink. "What are you?" he continued, presently, in the same snappish, churlish tone. I told him a schoolmaster. "_Exempli gratiâ_," he answered quickly, and turning to the nearest stall, he indicated the title-page of a book. "Read me that, Master Schoolmaster." I did so. He grunted; and then, "You write? Show me your hand." I said I had no paper or ink there, but that if he would take me---- "Pooh, man, are you a fool?" he cried, impatiently. "Show me your right hand, middle finger, and I will find you _scribit_ or _non scribit_. So! And you want work?" "Yes," I said. "Hard work and little pay?" I said I wanted to make my living. "Ay, and maybe the first time you come to me, you will cut my throat, and rob my desk," he answered gruffly. "Hm! That touches you home, does it? However, ask for me to-morrow, at seven in the forenoon--Mr. Timothy Brome, at the sign of the Black Boy in Fleet Street." Now I was overjoyed, indeed. With such a prospect of employment, it seemed to me a small thing that I must pass the night in the streets; but even that I escaped. For when he was about to part from me, he asked me what money I had. None, I told him, "except the clipped guinea."