Mr., or, as he loved to be designated, Captain Jenkyns, had once followed the sea. But that was a long time ago. The serious part of his life had been spent on a Thames steamer. The outer man was nautical, and the carnal inner, as an inveterate craving for fiery drink clearly proved; but many years of fresh water seemed to have washed the true sailor’s kindly salt out of his nature. He was a thick-set, grizzled old man, with bibulous superannuation written on every wrinkle that mounted to his little red-rimmed eyes, and in every filament of the network of tiny red veins on his nose.
He was sitting in the leathern arm-chair, with his back to the parlour window, drinking his tea out of a saucer. Goddard and Lizzie sat decorously at the tea-table. It was a ceremonious occasion, as the use of the parlour, the potted ham and seed-cake on the table, Captain Jenkyns’s brass-buttoned coat, and the little blue ribbon round Lizzie’s neck, with the bow tied kittenishly under her ear, all combined to testify. Previously Goddard used to join the domestic circle in the kitchen, but then he had never been to Birmingham nor opened a banking account at the City Bank. That made all the difference.
So far, conversation had not been animated. Goddard had conducted it practically alone, sketching his visit to Birmingham, which had terminated to his complete satisfaction. An offer for the shop and good-will was already under consideration. The solicitors had advanced him a good round sum for present needs.
“To keep a shop warn’t good enough for yer, I suppose,” Captain Jenkyns had remarked in his agreeable way.
“No,” Goddard had answered coldly--he did not love the captain. “It wasn’t.”
And then he had proceeded with his story. But the talk languished. Lizzie, never expansive in her father’s presence, was less so to-day than usual. Goddard’s sudden accession to wealth--riches beyond the dreams of Lizzie’s avarice--somewhat awed her, after the first excitement had passed. His cleverness, his personality, all in fact that differentiated him from Joe Forster the tobacconist and his class, had always put him a little beyond her reach; but now that he was a rich man as well, she felt frightened and abashed. She offered him bread and butter timidly, and flushed scarlet when she awkwardly flooded his tea-cup. Then crumbs of cake went the wrong way, and she retired to the window to hide her discomfiture.