George Gissing

“ SAID MRS. MAYHEW DIFFIDENTLY. His tongue faltered. He looked at the woman, and saw how her countenance had fallen.
"Ten pounds," he said abruptly, "couldn't last—for my support—more than a few weeks."
"Not by itself, sir," replied the other, eagerly; "but money grows so when it's put into trade. I do believe it would bring in a pound a week. Or, at all events, I'm quite sure it would bring enough——"
She glanced, involuntarily, at the breakfast table, which seldom showed anything but bread and butter.
"In that case," said Filmer, laughing, "I should be a partner in the business." ”

“ She smirked. "There's nobody in. Would you mind coming into the shop?"
He followed. The well-remembered odour of Mrs. Mayhew's merchandise enveloped him about, and helped still further to confuse his thoughts in a medley of past and present. Over the shop window hung a dirty yellow blind, through which the sunshine struggled dimly. Filmer hesitated for a moment.
"Who is Mr. Marshall, 'Manda?" he was able to ask at length.
"Don't you know, sir?" She stood before him in a perky attitude, her fingers interlaced. "You've seen him. A tall man—dark-looking——"
"DON'T YOU KNOW, SIR?" ”

“ For Mrs. Mayhew did not let a day pass without assuring him that his ten pounds—his share in the partnership—produced more than enough to represent the cost of his board and lodging. He lived better than in the old days, had an excellent supper on coming home from the Museum, a warm breakfast before setting out. And these things caused him no astonishment. The literary recluse sees no limit to the potentialities of "trade."
At length he remembered that ten weeks had gone by, and on a Sunday morning he summoned his partner to a conference. ”

“ In shop and house she had the assistance of a young girl, the daughter of the people who occupied the upper rooms, and it was this girl—Amanda Wilkes by name, and known to her friends as 'Manda—who generally waited upon Filmer.
"Mrs. Mayhew," he began gravely, "I begin to feel that I have no right to continue living in this way. You have long since paid me back the small sum I lent you——"
"Oh, but I have explained to you, sir," broke in the other, who bated nothing of her accustomed respect, that money is always making more—indeed it is. ”

“ AT the top of a dim-windowed house near Gray's Inn Road, in two rooms of his own furnishing, lived a silent, solitary man. He was not old (six-and-thirty at most) , and the gentle melancholy of his countenance suggested no quarrel with the world, but rather a placid absorption in congenial studies. ”

“ His name was Filmer; he had occupied this lodging for seven or eight years; only at long intervals did a letter reach him, and the sole person who visited his retreat was Mrs. Mayhew, the charwoman. Mrs. Mayhew came at ten o'clock in the morning, and busied herself about the rooms for an hour or so. Sometimes the lodger remained at home, sitting at his big table heaped with books, and exchanging a friendly word with his attendant; sometimes he had gone out before her arrival, and in that case he would have been found at the British Museum. Filmer abjured the society of men for that of words ”

“ Whereat Filmer smiled pensively, and nodded.
No life could be less eventful than his. He enjoyed an income of seventy pounds, and looked not for increase. Of his costume he took no thought, his diet was the simplest conceivable. He wanted no holidays. Leisure to work in his own way, blessed independence—this sufficed for him.
On a morning of December (the year was 1869) Mrs. Mayhew came to the house as usual, went upstairs, and tapped at Filmer's door. On entering, she was surprised to see a fireless grate, and on the table no trace of breakfast. Filmer stood by the window ”

“ Mrs. Mayhew, meanwhile, had entered exultantly into possession of her business premises; the little shop was stocked much better than for a long time, and customers followed each other throughout the day. In his utter ignorance of such transactions, the philologist accepted what she had at first told him as a sufficient explanation of the worthy woman's establishment in shop-keeping. To a practical eye, it would have seemed not a little mysterious that some twenty pounds had sufficed for all the preparations ”

“ AGAIN SHE DROPPED HER EYES AND FIDGETED. A day or two later, as the girl 'Manda served his breakfast, she looked at him oddly, and seemed desirous of saying something. This young person was now about seventeen, and rather given to friskiness, though Mrs. Mayhew called her an excellent girl, and treated her like a sister.
"If you please. Mr. Filmer," she began, in an unusually diffident tone. ”

“ Such old friends——"
Her dubious look and incomplete phrase of assent—her eyes cast down—troubled him profoundly. But the dreaded interview was over. In a few days he removed his furniture. Happily the leave-taking was not in private; 'Manda and her mother both witnessed it; yet poor Mrs. Mayhew's eyes had a sorrowful dimness, and her attempted gaiety weighed upon his spirits.
He lived now in the south-west of London, and refrained even from visits to the British Museum. The breaking-up of his lifelong habits, the idleness into which he had fallen, encouraged a morbid activity of conscience ”