'Is it your ambition,' he asked, with fiery sarcasm, 'to join a
troupe of nigger minstrels?'

Oliver was startled into the military posture of attention. He
answered, with some embarrassment:

'I can't say it is.'

'Yet anyone would suppose so,' went on Godwin, hotly. 'Though you
are employed in a shop, I should have thought you might still aim at
behaving like a gentleman.'

Indisposed to quarrel, and possessed of small skill in verbal fence,
Oliver drew aside with shadowed brow. As the brothers still had to
share one bedroom, they were presently alone together, and their
muteness, as they lay down to sleep, showed the estrangement that
had at length come between them. When all had been dark and still
for half-an-hour, Godwin spoke.

'Are you awake?'

'Yes.'

'There was something about Uncle Andrew. I didn't mention. He talks
of opening an eating-house just opposite Whitelaw.'

'Oh.'

The tone of this signified nothing more than curiosity.