ur
chapters of 'Lynwood.' He had rather a dismal lodging-house bedroom,
with faded wall-paper and a prosaic snuff-coloured carpet. On a rickety
table in the window was his desk, and a portfolio full of blue foolscap,
but he had done what he could to make the place habitable; his Oxford
pictures were on the walls--Hoffman's 'Christ speaking to the Woman
taken in Adultery,' hanging over the mantelpiece--it had always been a
favourite of his. I remember that, as he read the description of Lynwood
and his wife, I kept looking from him to the Christ in the picture till
I could almost have fancied that each face bore the same expression. Had
this strange monotonous life with that old brute of a Major brought him
some new perception of those words, "Neither do I condemn thee"? But
when he stopped reading, I, true to my character, forgot his affairs in
my own, as we sat talking far into the night--talking of that luckless
month at Mondisfield, of all the problems it had opened up, and of my
wretchedness.

"You were in town all September?" he asked; "you gave up Blachington?"

"Yes," I replied. "What did I care for country houses in such a mood as
that."

He acquiesced, and I went on talking of my grievances, and it was not
till I was in the train on my way back to London that I remembered how
a look of disappointment had passed over his face just at the moment.
Evidently he had counted on learning something about Freda from me, and
I--well, I had clean forgotten both her existence and his passionate
love.

Something, probably self-interest, the desire for my friend's company,
and so forth, took me down to Bath pretty frequently in those days;
luckily the Major had a sort of liking for me, and was always polite
enough; and dear old Derrick--well, I believe my visits really helped
to brighten him up. At any rate he said he couldn't have borne his life
without them, and for a sceptical, dismal, cynical fellow like me to
hear that was somehow flattering. The mere force of contrast did me
good. I used to come back on the Monday wondering that Derrick didn't
cut his throat, and realising that, after all, it was something to be
a free agent, and to have comfortable rooms in Montague Street, with
no old bear of a drunkard to disturb my peace. And then a sort of
admiration sprang up in my heart, and the cynicism bred of melancholy
broodings over solitary pipes was less rampant than usual.

It was, I think, early in the new year th