Peter would sit in the evening, in his
chair, staring in front of him, silent, and hearing nothing that Stephen
said to him. With Stephen life was a case of having money or not having
it--if one had not money one went without everything possible and waited
until the money came again ... the tide was sure to turn. But, with Peter,
this was all a fight against his father who sat, apparently, in the dark
rooms at Scaw House, willing disaster. Now, as Stephen and all the sensible
world knew, this was nonsense--
It was also, in some still stranger way, a fight against London itself--not
London, a place of streets and houses, of Oxford Street and Piccadilly
Circus but London, an animal--a kind of dragon as far as Stephen could make
it out with scales and a tail--
Now what was one to make of this except that the boy's head was being
turned and that he ought to see a doctor.
There was also the further question of an appeal to Brockett's or Mr.
Zanti. Stephen knew that Herr Gottfried or Mr. Zanti would lend help
eagerly did they but know, and he supposed, from the things that Peter had
told him, that there were also warm friends at Brockett's; but the boy had
made him swear, with the last order of solemnity, that he would send no
word to either place. Peter had said that he would never speak to him
again should he do such a thing.
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