Schooled at Harrow, a graduate of Cambridge, he had meditated
the choice of a profession until it seemed, on the whole, too late to
profess anything at all; and, as there was no need of such exertion, he
settled himself to a life of innocent idleness, hard by the country-house
of his wealthy and influential friend, Mr. Charman. Softly the years flowed
by. His thoughts turned once or twice to marriage, but a profound
diffidence withheld him from the initial step; in the end, he knew himself
born for bachelorhood, and with that estate was content. Well for him had
he seen as clearly the delusiveness of other temptations! In an evil moment
he listened to Mr. Charman, whose familiar talk was of speculation, of
companies, of shining percentages. Not on his own account was Mr. Tymperley
lured: he had enough and to spare; but he thought of his sister, married to
an unsuccessful provincial barrister, and of her six children, whom it
would be pleasant to help, like the opulent uncle of fiction, at their
entering upon the world. In Mr. Charman he put blind faith, with the result
that one morning he found himself shivering on the edge of ruin; the touch
of confirmatory news, and over he went.
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