"
Mr. Simpson shook his head and, ordering a couple of glasses of bitter,
attacked his in silence.
"It might be done gradual," he said, after a long interval. "It don't
do anybody good at the warehouse to look old."
"Make a clean job of it," counselled Mr. Mills, who was very fond of a
little cheap excitement. "Get it over and done with. You've got good
features, and you'd look splendid clean-shaved." Mr. Simpson smiled
faintly. "Only on Wednesday the barmaid here was asking after you,"
pursued Mr. Mills. Mr. Simpson smiled again. "She says to me, 'Where's
Gran'pa?' she says, and when I says, haughty like, 'Who do you mean?'
she says, 'Father Christmas!' If you was to tell her that you are only
fifty-three, she'd laugh in your face."
"Let her laugh," said the other, sourly.
"Come out and get it off," said Mr. Mills, earnestly. "There's a
barber's in Bird Street; you could go in the little back room, where he
charges a penny more, and get it done without anybody being a bit the
wiser."
He put his hand on Mr. Simpson's shoulder, and that gentleman, with a
glare in the direction of the fair but unconscious offender, rose in a
hypnotized fashion and followed him out.
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