Affairs got more and more exasperating and strained under these
pressures. The window was boarded up, and an unpleasant
altercation about their delay in repairing it with the new
landlord, a Bun Hill butcher--and a loud, bellowing, unreasonable
person at that--served to remind them of their unsettled troubles
with the old. Things were at this pitch when Bert bethought
himself of creating a sort of debenture capital in the business
for the benefit of Tom. But, as I have said, Tom had no
enterprise in his composition. His idea of investment was the
stocking; he bribed his brother not to keep the offer open.

And then ill-luck made its last lunge at their crumbling business
and brought it to the ground.

2

It is a poor heart that never rejoices, and Whitsuntide had an
air of coming as an agreeable break in the business complications
of Grubb & Smallways. Encouraged by the practical outcome of
Bert's negotiations with his brother, and by the fact that half
the hiring-stock was out from Saturday to Monday, they decided to
ignore the residuum of hiring-trade on Sunday and devote that day
to much-needed relaxation and refreshment--to have, in fact, an
unstinted good time, a beano on Whit Sunday and return
invigorated to grapple with their difficulties and the Bank
Holiday repairs on the Monday. No good thing was ever done by
exhausted and dispirited men. It happened that they had made the
acquaintance of two young ladies in employment in Clapham, Miss
Flossie Bright and Miss Edna Bunthorne, and it was resolved