Time went by, and I returned to Raxton. Just when I had determined
that, come what would, I would go into Wales, Wynne one day told me
that Winnie was coming to live with him at Raxton, her aunt having
lately died. 'The English lady,' said he, 'who lived with them so
long and eddicated Winifred, has gone to live at Carnarvon to get the
sea air.'

This news was at once a joy and a perplexity.

Wynne, though still the handsomest and finest man in Raxton, had sunk
much lower in intemperance of late. He now generally wound up a
conversation with me by a certain stereotyped allusion to the dryness
of the weather, which I perfectly understood to mean that he felt
thirsty, and that an offer of half-a-crown for beer would not be
unacceptable. He was a proud man in everything except in reference to
beer. But he seemed to think there was no degradation in asking for
money to get drunk with, though to have asked for it to buy bread
would, I suppose, have wounded his pride. I did not then see so
clearly as I now do the wrong of giving him those half-crowns. His
annuity he had long since sold.

Spite of all his delinquencies, however, my father liked him; so did
my uncle Aylwin of Alvanley. But my mother seemed positively to hate
him. It was the knowledge of this that caused my anxiety about
Winifred's return. I felt that complications must arise.

At this time I used to go to Dullingham every day. The clergyman
there was preparing me for college.