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There was also the further question of an appeal to Brockett's or Mr. Zanti. Stephen knew that Herr Gottfried or Mr. Zanti would lend help eagerly did they but know, and he supposed, from the things that Peter had told him, that there were also warm friends at Brockett's; but the boy had made him swear, with the last order of solemnity, that he would send no word to either place.

Downstairs there was much bread and butter and bacon and eggs, and beer. The woman waited upon them but they were all very silent and Peter was too sleepy to be hungry. The table was cleared and Mr. Zanti sat smoking his pipe and talking to the woman.

At last again, "Oh, just the leetlest piece of beef for a poor old man " and then whimpering and "poor old man" repeated at intervals that lengthened gradually into sleep. At last the meal was over, the things had been cleared away, and Peter was bending over a sum in preparation for lessons on Monday. Zanti laughing until the tears ran down his face."

"Bad old boy!" He scarcely glanced up. "I'm not coming yet caught by work." "Don't be at it too late." He made no reply. She closed the door softly behind her. Then, out of the wind and rain, came Mr. Zanti. Three days after Peter's visit to Brockett's he was finishing a letter before dressing for dinner.

Zanti smiling. Peter read it. He could not understand it and it was signed "John Simmons" ... but it was certainly in Stephen's handwriting. "Thank you," said Peter in rather a quivering voice and he turned away, gulping down his disappointment. Mr. Zanti patted him on the shoulder. "That's right, my boy. Ah, I expect you miss your friend. You will be lonely here, yes?

"There's a place I been before down East End not much of a place for your sort, but just for a bit...." For a moment Peter's thoughts swept back to the shop. "Poor Zanti!" He half turned. "After so many years ... the good old chap." Then he pulled himself up and set his shoulders. "Well, half-past ten " The streets were, at the instant, almost deserted.

Herr Gottfried shuffled away to some hidden resting-place of his own and Peter found supper waiting for him in the room at the back. He ate this alone, for Mr. Zanti was not there and during these three days he was hardly visible at all. He was up in the morning before Peter was and he came to bed when Peter was already asleep.

"No, I haven't cleared it that's just the point. I don't suppose one ever clears anything. All the time I was with Zanti I was reading so hard and living so safely that it was only at moments, when I was alone, that I thought about Treliss at all. But these last weeks it's been coming on me full tide." "What's been coming on you?" "Well, Scaw House, I suppose ... and my father and grandfather.

He puzzled his brain to recall the connection and then, as he passed Zachary Tan's shop, the figure turned in and showed, for a moment, his face. It was that strange man from London, Mr. Emilio Zanti....

There was very much of the boy still in him and he began to look back upon the days that he had spent with no other company than his own thoughts as cold and friendless. Zachary Tan had been always ready to receive him warmly. Why had he passed him so churlishly by and refused his outstretched hand? But there was more in it than that. Mr. Zanti attracted him most compellingly.