Mr. Barradine had rung a bell, and a servant was standing at the door.
"Good day to you, Mr. Dale. You're going home, I suppose?"
"Not for a fortnight, sir."
"Ah! I hope to return to the Abbey on Thursday morning;" and quite
obviously Mr. Barradine now intended to gratify Dale by a few polite
sentences of small talk, and thus show him that his offense had been
pardoned. "Yes, I soon begin to pine for my garden. Friday, at latest,
sees me home again. I always call the Abbey home. No place like home,
Dale."
Dale going out, through the long passage to the hall, felt momentarily
depressed by a sense of humiliating failure in the midst of his
apparent success. If only he could have fought them and beaten them
alone, as a strong man fighting unaided, instead of being pulled
through the battle by that veinous, blotchy, ringed hand! However, he
promptly tried to banish all such vague discomfort from his mind.
All of it was gone when he got back to the lodging-house, and found
his wife established in their new room.
VI
"The Acadia Theater! So be it. They're all one to me."
Mavis had chosen this famous music hall because, as she explained,
Chirgwin was performing at it, and her aunt had always said that
Chirgwin was the most excruciatingly funny of all music-hall artists.
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