"Open the window, do you 'ear?
and don't let none of the dust get out into the composing-room, or there'll be a row.

Come and tell me when you've done the floor, and I'll show you 'ow to do them cases.

Rattle along, do you 'ear?
or you won't get it done to-day;" and Mr Barber, who had had his day of sweeping out the shops, departed, slamming the door behind him.
Things had come to a crisis with Reginald Cruden early in his business career.
He had _come_ into the City that morning prepared to face a good deal.
He had not counted on much sympathy or consideration from his new employers; he had even vaguely made up his mind he would have to rough it at first; but to be shut up in a dirty room with a broom in his hand by a cad who could not even talk grammar was a humiliation on which he had never once calculated.
Tossing the broom unceremoniously into a corner, he opened the door and walked out of the room.

Barber was already out of sight, chuckling inwardly over the delicious task he had been privileged to set to his dandy subordinate, and none of the men working near knew or cared what this pale, handsome new boy did either in or out of the back case-room.
Reginald walked through them to the passage outside, not much caring where he went or whom he met.

If he were to meet Mr Barber, or Mr Durfy, or the manager himself, so much the better.