Let us be just; ’Arry had, like every other man, his better moments.  He knew that he had made himself contemptible to his mother, to Richard, and to Alice, and the knowledge was so far from agreeable that it often drove him to recklessness.  That was his way of doing homage to the better life; he had no power of will to resist temptation, but he could go to meet it doggedly out of sheer dissatisfaction with himself.  Our social state ensures destruction to such natures; it has no help for them, no patient encouragement.  Naturally he hardened himself in vicious habits.  Despised by his own people, he soothed his injured vanity by winning a certain predominance among the contemptible.  The fact that he had been on the point of inheriting a fortune in itself gave him standing; he told his story in public-houses and elsewhere, and relished the distinction of having such a story to tell.  Even as his brother Richard could not rest unless he was prominent as an agitator, so it became a necessity to ’Arry to lead in the gin-palace and the music-hall.  He made himself the aristocrat of rowdyism.

But it was impossible to live without ready money, and his mother, though supplying him with board and lodging, refused to give him a penny.  He made efforts on his own account to obtain employment, but without result.  At last there was nothing for it but to humble himself before Richard.

He did it with an ill-enough grace.  Early one morning he presented himself at the house in Holloway.  Richard was talking with his wife in the sitting-room, breakfast being still on the table.  On the visitor’s name being brought to him, he sent Adela away and allowed the scapegrace to be admitted.

’Arry shuffled to a seat and sat leaning forward, holding his hat between his knees.

‘Well, what do you want?’ Richard asked severely.  He was glad that ’Arry had at length come, and he enjoyed assuming the magisterial attitude.

‘I want to find a place,’ ’Arry replied, without looking up, and in a dogged voice.  ’I’ve been trying to get one, and I can’t.  I think you might help a feller.’

’What’s the good of helping you?  You’ll be turned out of any place in a week or two.’

‘No, I shan’t!’

‘What sort of a place do you want?’

‘A clerk’s, of course.’

He pronounced the word ‘clerk’ as it is spelt; it made him seem yet more ignoble.

‘Have you given up drink?’

No answer

‘Before I try to help you,’ said Mutimer, ’you’ll have to take the pledge.’

‘All right!’ ’Arry muttered.

Then a thought occurred to Richard.  Bidding his brother stay where he was, he went in search of Adela and found her in an upper room.

‘He’s come to ask me to help him to get a place,’ he said.  ’I don’t know very well how to set about it, but I suppose I must do something.  He promises to take the pledge.’

‘That will be a good thing,’ Adela replied.