X + 

There followed an anxious peace for three days, and then a rough man in a blue jersey, in the intervals of trying to choke himself with bread and cheese and pickled onions, broke out abruptly into information. + 

“Jim’s lagged again, Missus,” he said. + 

“What!” said the landlady. “Our Jim?” + 

“Your Jim,” said the man, and after an absolutely necessary pause for swallowing, added: “Stealin’ a ’atchet.” + 

He did not speak for some moments, and then he replied to Mr. Polly’s enquiries: “Yes, a ’atchet. Down Lammam way⁠—night before last.” + 

“What’d ’e steal a ’atchet for?” asked the plump woman. + 

“ ’E said ’e wanted a ’atchet.” + 

“I wonder what he wanted a hatchet for?” said Mr. Polly, thoughtfully. + 

“I dessay ’e ’ad a use for it,” said the gentleman in the blue jersey, and he took a mouthful that amounted to conversational suicide. There was a prolonged pause in the little bar, and Mr. Polly did some rapid thinking. + 

He went to the window and whistled. “I shall stick it,” he whispered at last. “ ’Atchets or no ’atchets.” + 

He turned to the man with the blue jersey when he thought him clear for speech again. “How much did you say they’d given him?” he asked. + 

“Three munce,” said the man in the blue jersey, and refilled anxiously, as if alarmed at the momentary clearness of his voice. + 