"We cannot use this."
Bending forward and clasping his hands, he said, "Could you not give me two shillings for it? There are two columns good. A shilling a column; surely that can't hurt you."
"I'll give you two shillings, and you can come back again if you are needy, but the MS. is of no use to us."
He took the money, and returned again and again for more. I found that he used to put fourpence in one pocket to meet the expense of his lodging-house bed, and he bought ten two-pennyworths of gin with the rest of the money. He always asked for two shillings, and always got it. I was not responsible for his mode of spending it.
And now the Doctor had turned up in the region of The Chequers. He was piteously, doggishly thankful for his drink, and he cried as he bleated out his prayers for my good health. Men cry readily when they come to be in the Doctor's condition. I asked him to take some soup. "I'm no great eater," he said; "but I'd like just one more with you—only one."
"Where do you lodge, Doctor?"
"To tell you the truth, I'm forced to put up with a berth in the old fowl-house at the bottom of the garden here. They let me stay there, but 'tis cold—cold."
"Do you work at all now?"
"Sometimes. But there is little doing—very little."
"How did you come to cease practising at the Bar, Doctor?"