"Care, dear?"
"Yes, about father—his living and getting well again and being happy as he used to be. What's happened to this place?"
She looked at him in the strangest way. He suddenly felt that he'd never seen her before.
"There are a number of things, Martin, that you don't understand—a number of things. You are away from us for years, you come back to us and expect things to be the same."
"You and Amy," he said, "both of you, have kept me out of everything since I came back. I believe you both hate me!"
She got up slowly from her seat, slowly put her spectacles away in their case, rubbed her fat little hands together, then suddenly licked inquisitively one finger as an animal might do. She spoke to him over her shoulder as she went to the door:
"Oh no, Martin, you speak too strongly."
Left then to his own devices he, at last, wandered out into the foggy streets. After a while he found himself outside a public-house and, after a moment's hesitation, he went in. He asked the stout, rubicund young woman behind the counter for a whisky. She gave him one; he drank that, and then another.
Afterwards he had several more, leaning over the bar, speaking to no one, seeing no one, hearing nothing, and scarcely tasting the drink. When he came out into the street again he knew that he was half drunk—not so drunk that he didn't know what he was doing. Oh dear, no. HE could drink any amount without feeling it. Nevertheless he had drunk so little during these last weeks that even a drop ... How foggy the streets were ... made it difficult to find your way home. But he was all right, he could walk straight, he could put his latch-key into the door at one try, HE was all right.
He was at home again. He didn't stop to hang up his hat and coat but went straight into the dining-room, leaving the door open behind him. He saw that the meal was still on the table just as they'd left it. Amy was there too.