Page:Mr. Wu (IA mrwumilnlouisejo00milniala).pdf/89

 Bradley had been at Queen's, but had worked while Basil played, and such intimacy as had been between them died away, naturally enough, in the wider life and the greater individual freedom and scope of 'Varsity. But they had met sometimes; and once Bradley had been of great service to Gregory.

When Basil had reached Hong Kong a year ago, John Bradley had been serving there for some time as a curate in the Cathedral Church of St. John.

The young priest had held out an eager, friendly hand at once, but Basil had almost ignored it. It was shabby of him, and he knew it at the time. He knew that the other's overtures were not in the least to the rich ship-owner's son, but altogether to an old schoolmate newly come to a foreign country.

The priest—he lived quite alone—was just sitting down to his solitary dinner when Basil's rickshaw came through the gate, ran up the path between the tall lychee trees, and stopped at the door.

The older man gave the younger the cordial greeting of their old days, and added, "Come and eat. Oh! but you must. I'm famished."

And Basil sat down, both glad and sorry to postpone even by half an hour the unpleasant tale he had come to tell.

The priest was no anchorite, and his simple food was good, his wine sound. Both had their flattering tonic effect upon the easily influenced peccant, and as he ate and drank his misdemeanor dwindled away in his own eyes, until almost it seemed to him that he had been more sinned against than sinner.

But it seemed nothing of the sort to John Bradley, and it was soon evident as Gregory unfolded his errand while they smoked on the tiny balcony that jutted out