He carried in the treasures. But that the three little ones were very meek spirited, they would have shouted at the sight. Roland lavishly spread the marmalade on the bread-and-scrape, and began pulling out shrimps for the company round, while he talked of Hamish.
"They are saying that those reviews that were so harsh upon his books have helped to kill him," said Mrs. Yorke, in a low tone, turning from the table to face Roland.
"But for those reviews he'd not have died," answered Roland. "I never will believe it. Illness might have come on, but he'd have had the spirit to throw it off again."
"Yes. When I sit and look at him, Roland, it seems as if I and Gerald were wretches that ought to hide ourselves. I say to myself, it was not my fault; but I feel it for all that."
"Why, what do you mean?" asked Roland.
"About the reviews. I can't bear to go there now."
"What about the reviews?"
"It was Gerald who wrote them."
Roland, for convenience sake, had the plate of shrimps on his knee during the picking process. He rested from his work and stared in a kind of puzzle. Winny continued.
"Those reviews were all Gerald's doings. That dreadful one in the Snarler he wrote himself; here, and was two days over it, getting to it at times as ideas and strong words occurred to him to make it worse and worse--just as he wrote the one of praise on his own book. The other reviews, that were every bit as bad, he got written. I read every word of the one in the Snarler in manuscript. I wanted to tell him it was wicked, but he might have shaken me. He said he owed Hamish Channing a grudge, and should get his book damned. That's not my word, you know, Roland. And, all the while, it was Hamish who was doing so much for me and the poor children; finding us in food when Gerald did not."