The Hole in the Wall by Arthur Morrison

My father's death wrought in Grandfather Nat a change that awed me. He looked older and paler -- even smaller. He talked less to me, but began, I fancied, to talk to himself. Withal, his manner was kinder than before, if that were possible; though it was with a sad kindness that distressed and troubled me. More than once I woke at night with candle-light on my face, and found him gazing down at me with a grave doubt in his eyes; whereupon he would say nothing, but pat my cheek, and turn away.

Early one evening as I sat in the bar-parlour, and my grandfather stood moodily at the door between that and the bar, a man came into the private compartment whom I had seen there frequently before. He was, in fact, the man who had brought the silver spoons on the morning when I first saw Ratcliff Highway, and he was perhaps the most regular visitor to the secluded corner of the bar. This time he slipped quietly and silently in at the door, and, remaining just within it, out of sight from the main bar, beckoned; his manner suggesting business above the common.