"Roland!"
"It's true. He's as heartless as an owl; Ger always was, you know."
"But you are his brother."
"Brothers and sisters don't count for much with Gerald. Besides, I'm down in the world, and he'd not take a pitch-fork to lift me up in it again. Would you believe it, Arthur, he likes nothing better than to fling in my teeth that miserable old affair at Galloway's--the banknote. The very last time we ever met--I had run into Winny's lodgings to take some dolls' clothes for Kitty from little Nelly Channing--Ger taunted me with that back affair, and more than hinted, not for the first time, that I'd helped myself to some money lost last summer by Bede Greatorex. If I'd known Ger was at home, I'd never have gone: Miss Nelly might have done her errand herself. Have you read his book?"
"Ye-es, I have," answered Arthur, in a rather dubious tone. "Have you?"
"No; for I couldn't," candidly avowed Roland. "I got nearly through one volume, and it was a task. It was impossible to make head or tail of it. I know I'm different from other folks, have not half the gumption in me I ought to have, and don't judge of things as they do, which is all through having gone to Port Natal; but I thought the book a rubbishing book, Arthur, and a bad one into the bargain: Where's the use of writing a book if people can't read it?"
"Did you read the reviews on it?"
"Oh law! I've heard enough about them. Had they been peacock's feathers, Ger would have stuck them in his cap. And he pretty nigh did. I'll tell you what book I read--and cried over it too--and got up from it feeling better and happier--and that's Hamish's."
A light, like a glow of gladness, shone in Arthur Channing's honest grey eyes. "When I read that book, I felt thankful that a man should have been found to write such," he said in a hushed tone. "I should have felt just the same if he had been a stranger."
"Ay, indeed: it was something of that I meant to say. And I wish all the world could read it!" added impulsive Roland. "And did you read the reviews on it?"