Theobald's Row was as depressing in the morning as it had been in the evening, and looked as if a bath would do it good. The workingmen's lodging houses bore even a more striking resemblance to prisons, and the men and women I passed looked as if they had been up all night, and had hurried out to their depressing occupations without having had recourse to soap and water. On the doorstep of Dr. Cooper's shop the same half dozen children were playing the same games with pieces of broken crockery and dry mud, and bore no appearance of having been washed since I last set eyes on them. One of the children, catching sight of me, jumped up and ran into the shop, screaming: "Here's the gentleman, mother!" At which summons the slatternly woman immediately presented herself. It struck me that there was something aggressive in her aspect. "Oh," she said, in no amiable tone, "it's you!" "Yes," I replied, "it is I." "And you call yourself a workingman," she exclaimed. "I am not aware that I have done so." "So my husband told me last night; you are the man who called last night, and went to seek my husband at the Britannia. Don't deny it." "I have not the least intention of doing so. You gave me the information where to see him." "So I did, and he said you pretended to be a workingman. Now, a workingman wouldn't say, 'it is I'; he'd say 'it's me.' I have been brought pretty low, but I had fair schooling when I was young, and I know a workingman from a gentleman." "Well," I observed, "say that I am a gentleman; is that anything against me?" "It is everything against you. I heard from my husband all that passed between you--as nearly as he could remember, in the state he was. When he's in his cups his tongue runs too free, and you gave him rope enough. Perhaps you're not a gentleman, after all. What do you say to detective?" "I am not a detective," I answered, with, I confess, a rather guilty feeling, for if I was not doing the work of a detective, what else was I doing? "For what reason on earth should a detective be running after your husband?" "An admission!" she cried, and I saw that I had to do with a sharp woman. "Then you _are_ running after him." She folded her arms defiantly. "Now, what for?" I smiled rather feebly as I said, "You would not believe me if I told you I have come to put something in his way." "You are right there. I should not believe you." "But it is the truth, nevertheless, and it will not serve me to talk it over with you. Can I see your husband?" "You cannot see him." "Is he not at home?" "He is not at home." "Will he be in soon?" "He will not be in soon." There was no mistaking her meaning; she regarded me as an enemy, and it was her intention to be personally offensive. "You do not wish me and your husband to meet?" "You shan't meet if I can help it." "Then you must have something to fear."