“I don’t know,” she replied, as she went to the oven to turn a pie that was baking. She put her arm to her forehead and brushed aside her hair, leaving a mark of flour on her nose. For a moment or two she remained kneeling on the fender, looking into the fire and thinking. “He was in a poor way when he came here, could eat nothing, sick every morning. I suppose it’s his liver. They all end like that.” She continued to wipe the large black plums and put them in the dish.
“Hardening of the liver?” I asked. She nodded.
“And is he in bed?” I asked again.
“Yes,” she replied. “It’s as I say, if he’d get up and potter about a bit, he’d get over it. But he lies there skulking.”
“And what time will he get up?” I insisted.
“I don’t know. He may crawl down somewhere towards tea-time. Do you want to see him? That’s what you came for, isn’t it?”
She smiled at me with a little sarcasm, and added: “You always thought more of him than anybody, didn’t you? Ah, well, come up and see him.”
I followed her up the back stairs, which led out of the kitchen, and which emerged straight in a bedroom. We crossed the hollow-sounding plaster-floor of this naked room and opened a door at the opposite side. George lay in bed watching us with apprehensive eyes.
“Here is Cyril come to see you,” said Emily, “so I’ve brought him up, for I didn’t know when you’d be downstairs.”
A small smile of relief came on his face, and he put out his hand from the bed. He lay with the
