Effie would surely not keep me on, and that was all about it. I had
merely to make no defence of myself. And even if I chose to make one I
was not certain that she would believe me, so cunning had been the
accusations against me, with that tiny thread of fact which I make no
doubt has so often enabled historians to give a false colouring to
their recitals without stating downright untruths. Indeed, my
shameless appearance in the garb of a cow person would alone have cast
doubt upon the truth as I knew it to be.
Then suddenly I suffered an illumination. I perceived all at once that
to make any sort of defence of myself would not be cricket. I mean to
say, I saw the proceedings of the previous day in a new light. It is
well known that I do not hold with the abuse of alcoholic stimulants,
and yet on the day before, in moments that I now confess to have been
slightly elevated, I had been conscious of a certain feeling of
fellowship with my two companions that was rather wonderful. Though
obviously they were not university men, they seemed to belong to what
in America would be called the landed gentry, and yet I had felt
myself on terms of undoubted equality with them. It may be believed or
not, but there had been brief spaces when I forgot that I was a
gentleman's man.
Pages:
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100