ith's head was still full of what he had heard when he went to bed
that night, and he didn't know whether to feel happy or unhappy about
it. His father had grown bigger and more interesting in some ways, and
yet the boy's chief impression was of a failure and a fall. It was this
impression that stuck most deeply in his mind.

XXI

Keith's home was not one of those hospitable places with the doors
always wide open, to which people are drawn almost against their will
and from which they come away with difficulty. Perhaps it was, above
all, the spirit of the father that settled this matter. To him, more
than to any Englishman, his home was his castle, and he liked to keep
the drawbridge raised against unwelcome company. And most company seemed
unwelcome, although at times, when the right persons appeared at the
right moment, he could be happy as a child and unbend in a manner that
made Keith gape with wonder. When her good mood prevailed, the mother,
too, was touchingly eager for the diversion provided by a chance visit,
but when the dark moments came, she shunned everybody, while at the same
time she watched any prolonged failure to call with morbid
suspiciousness, ascribing it promptly to a sense of superiority toward
herself and her family. Granny was glad enough to talk to anybody, but
she would never ask any one to call, and if no one came, she was apt to
dig out some particularly bitter proverb, like "money alone has
many friends."

Both parents could be hospitable enough when occasion so demanded, but
it was a formal thing with them, exercised only after due preparation.
In many ways, they were large-heartedly generous, but only in a serious
manner, when actual need required it. They might give freely beyond what
they could well afford, but the father could be out of humour for days
if some little thing regarded as particularly his own had been touched
or used by another member of the family.

As it was, people came and went a good deal, but they came formally or
because some specific errand brought them, and most of the errands,
Keith soon realized, were connected with a desire for help. The old
women living like nightbirds in the garret, would drop in frequently,
and almost invariably with some tale of woe that sooner or later drew
from the mother relief in one form or another. And one of Keith's
earliest tasks, half coveted and half feared, was to walk up to one of
the attics with a plate of soup or a sau