Barry Pain

“ It is so seldom that facts are just as they should be, that I think it worth while to mention this. If Albert Chippel had not been well off, he would have been unable to procure for himself the vast amount of mechanical apparatus which his soul loved, which to the last he fully believed saved him trouble, and without which he would have pined and died. If he had been married, he would either have driven his wife mad, or she would have obtained a judicial separation. He nearly drove his friends mad.
You went into Chippel's rooms, and he offered you a cigar. ”

“ He would be offended because you would not cut your cigar with his patent cigar-cutter, which every now and then worked quite nicely. He would not even let you light that cigar simply. He struck a match and lit a methylated-spirit lamp, when you lit your cigar from the lamp. If you suggested that you might just as well have lit the cigar from the match, he would tell you with a smile that he liked to do things comfortably.
When the ordinary man wants to read a book, he takes the book, sits down, and reads. That was not nearly complicated enough for Chippel. ”

“ The longest-living author of this work died in 1928, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 95 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works. ”