Adela marvelled that he could so entirely forget the sufferings of his sister; she had had so many proofs of his affection for Alice.  In fact he was far from forgetting her, but he made strange distinction between her and her husband, and had a feeling that in doing his utmost to injure Rodman he was in a manner avenging Alice.  His love for Alice was in no degree weakened, but—­if the state can be understood—­he was jealous of the completeness with which she had abandoned him to espouse the cause of her husband.  Alice had renounced her brother; she never saw him, and declared that she never would speak to him again.  And Mutimer had no fear lest she should suffer want.  Rodman had a position of some kind in the City; he and his wife lived for a while in lodgings, then took a house at Wimbledon.

One of Mutimer’s greatest anxieties had been lest he should have a difficulty henceforth in supporting his mother in the old house.  The economical plan would have been for Adela and himself to go and live with the old woman, but he felt that to be impossible.  His mother would never become reconciled to Adela, and, if the truth must be told, he was ashamed to make known to Adela his mother’s excessive homeliness.  Then again he was still estranged from the old woman.  Though he often thought of what Alice had said to him on that point, month after month went by and he could not make up his mind to go to Wilton Square.  Having let the greater part of her house, Mrs. Mutimer needed little pecuniary aid; once she returned money which he had sent to her ’Arry still lived with her, and ’Arry was a never-ending difficulty.  After his appearance in the police court, he retired for a week or two into private life; that is to say, he contented himself with loafing about the streets of Hoxton and the City, and was at home by eleven o’clock nightly, perfectly sober.  The character of this young man was that of a distinct class, comprising the sons of mechanics who are ruined morally by being taught to consider themselves above manual labour.  Had he from the first been put to a craft, he would in all likelihood have been no worse than the ordinary English artisan—­probably drinking too much and loafing on Mondays, but not sinking below the level of his fellows in the workshop.  His positive fault was that shared by his brother and sister—­personal vanity.  It was encouraged from the beginning by immunity from the only kind of work for which he was fitted, and the undreamt-of revolution in his prospects gave fatal momentum to all his worst tendencies.  Keene and Rodman successively did their best, though unintentionally, to ruin him.  He was now incapable of earning his living by any continuous work.  Since his return to London he had greatly extended his circle of acquaintances, which consisted of idle fellows of the same type, youths who hang about the lowest fringe of clerkdom till they definitely class themselves either with the criminal community or with those who make a living by unrecognised pursuits which at any time may chance to bring them within the clutches of the law.  To use a coarse but expressive word, he was a hopeless blackguard.