"I suppose you are hard up," I remarked insolently.
"I should be a damned fool if I thought I had any chance of
borrowing money from you."
"You've come down in the world if you can bring yourself to flatter."
He grinned.
"You'll never really dislike me so long as I give you the
opportunity to get off a good thing now and then."
I had to bite my lip to prevent myself from laughing. What he
said had a hateful truth in it, and another defect of my
character is that I enjoy the company of those, however
depraved, who can give me a Roland for my Oliver. I began to
feel that my abhorrence for Strickland could only be sustained
by an effort on my part. I recognised my moral weakness, but
saw that my disapprobation had in it already something of a pose;
and I knew that if I felt it, his own keen instinct had
discovered it, too. He was certainly laughing at me up his sleeve.
I left him the last word, and sought refuge in a shrug of the
shoulders and taciturnity.
Chapter XLI
We arrived at the house in which I lived. I would not ask him
to come in with me, but walked up the stairs without a word.
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