Page 85 (1/1)

Arthur and George, resigned now to the inevitable lady, had seen in the incident only the anxiety of a enerous in his treatic figure which Wratislaw brought with hie saw nothing "Do you know that you are going to have the Wisharts for neighbours for a couple of months yet? Old Wishart has taken Glenavelin fro at another time, but now it simply drove home the nail of his bitter reflections Alice would be near hith and competence He could not win her, and it is characteristic of the man that he had ceased to think of Mr Stocks as his rival He would lose her to no rival; to his ragged incapacity alone would his ill fortune be due

He struggled to act the part of the cheerful host, and Wratislaatched his efforts grimly He ate little at dinner, showed no desire to smoke, and played billiards so badly that Wratislaw, an execrable player, won the first and last game of his life The victor took hirant lawn

"You are taking things to heart," said he

"And I'm blessed if I can understand you To me it's sheer mania"

"And to me it's the last link in a chain I have suspected e is a hideous thing"

Wratislaw stood regarding his companion seriously "I wonder ill happen to you, Lewie Life is serious enough without inventing a crotchety virtue to make it miserable"

"Can't you understand me, Tommy? It isn't that I'm a cad, it's that I as are a matter chiefly of blood and bone, and I am not ht worth twopence Look at ardener's boy can beat enerous i grows cold and I am a dumb icicle when it coht I had kept , and I used to have pluck"