He now generally wound up a
conversation with me by a certain stereotyped allusion to the dryness
of the weather, which I perfectly understood to mean that he felt
thirsty, and that an offer of half-a-crown for beer would not be
unacceptable. He was a proud man in everything except in reference to
beer. But he seemed to think there was no degradation in asking for
money to get drunk with, though to have asked for it to buy bread
would, I suppose, have wounded his pride. I did not then see so
clearly as I now do the wrong of giving him those half-crowns. His
annuity he had long since sold.
Spite of all his delinquencies, however, my father liked him; so did
my uncle Aylwin of Alvanley. But my mother seemed positively to hate
him. It was the knowledge of this that caused my anxiety about
Winifred's return. I felt that complications must arise.
At this time I used to go to Dullingham every day. The clergyman
there was preparing me for college.
On the Sunday following the day when I got such momentous news from
Wynne, I was met suddenly, as my mother and I were leaving the church
after the service, by the gaze of a pair of blue eyes that arrested
my steps as by magic, and caused the church and the churchgoers to
vanish from my sight.
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