He gazed with displeasure upon us.
“This ’ere’s a nice use ter put Fleet Street to, I don’t think,” he said coldly.
This sarcastic rebuke rather damped us, and after Hatton had paid Malim his half-crown, and had invited me to visit him, we departed.
“Queer chap, Hatton,” said Malim as we walked up the Strand.
I was to discover at no distant date that he was distinctly a many-sided man. I have met a good many clergymen in my time, but I have never come across one quite like the Rev. John Hatton.
CHAPTER 9
JULIAN LEARNS MY SECRET
(James Orlebar Cloyster’s narrative continued)
A difficulty in the life of a literary man in London is the question of getting systematic exercise. At school and college I had been accustomed to play games every day, and now I felt the change acutely.
It was through this that I first became really intimate with John Hatton, and incidentally with Sidney Price, of the Moon Assurance Company. I happened to mention my trouble one night in Hatton’s rooms. I had been there frequently since my first visit.
“None of my waistcoats fit,” I remarked.