"She's an old woman," said Fearns. "And honest enough, you must admit. She came up to see my governess, and I happened to see her."
"But what should you do in my place?" Denry insisted.
"Since you ask, I should lower the rent and let her off the arrears," said Fearns.
"And supposing she didn't pay then? Let her have it rent-free because she's seventy? Or pitch her into the street?"
"Oh—Well—"
"Fearns would make her a present of the blooming house and give her a conveyance free!" a voice said humorously, and everybody laughed.
"Well, that's what I'll do," said Denry. "If Mr Fearns will do the conveyance free, I'll make her a present of the blooming house. That's the sort of grasping owner I am."
There was a startled pause. "I mean it," said Denry firmly, even fiercely, and raised his glass. "Here's to the Widow Hullins!"
There was a sensation, because, incredible though the thing was, it had to be believed. Denry himself was not the least astounded person in the crowded, smoky room. To him, it had been like somebody else talking, not himself. But, as always when he did something crucial, spectacular, and effective, the deed had seemed to be done by a mysterious power within him, over which he had no control.
This particular deed was quixotic, enormously unusual; a deed assuredly without precedent in the annals of the Five Towns. And he, Denry, had done it. The cost was prodigious, ridiculously and dangerously beyond his means. He could find no rational excuse for the deed. But he had done it. And men again wondered. Men had wondered when he led the Countess out to waltz. That was nothing to this. What! A smooth-chinned youth giving houses away—out of mere, mad, impulsive generosity.