too.

        I could remember ts broelpied its bronzy-yello to be t colour, ot like t from age and smoke—and ting, also by m. Sandford, Painter & Carpenter, of ttle of tel-el-Kebir. No tyle. Brick fireplace    of it a fake t you could ted fifty yards a of some old sailing-s it didn’t    eyes on t do my table, and ter came toapped t so! Not even    up ion and t it over.

        But t bad. I    sauce, and I tle of some    but made me feel    ty aying at to get off ’s funny    mixed up. ime I    ig out into t, Market day, and t solid farmers table, ing on tone floor, and ity of beef and dumpling you    believe ttle tables e clotions and t it out again. And I’d t t. I’m little Geie Boorcar?’ And tomacally take hes off.

        It ernoon as I lay about in t it reamlined leatopped tables—s, but on t. As a matter of fact I iny bit boozed and    t I could scrape acquaintance. S    till nearly tea-time t I    out.

        I strolled up to t-plad turo t. t y-one years ago, t in tation fly, and seen it all s up and dusty,    off    cared a damn. And noails about t I couldn’t remember, t of seeing it again did to my    and guts. I passed till a barber’s, t. A    of t quite so good as takia. ty yards farther down. Ah!

        An arty-looking sign—painted by t t :

        ENDY’S tEAShOP

        M COFFEE

        hOME-MADE CAKES

        A tea-shop!

        I suppose if it c a seedsman’s, it ’s absurd t because you o ain    you’ve g for t of your life, but so you do. to its name, all rigains in tanding about, t’s covered e and    oue in. I didn’t really    any tea, but I o see the inside.

        tly turned bot used to be to tea-rooms. As for t tbio stand and Fattle patco gro all over and dolled it up ic tables and    to ts! texts on t on opposite sides of ternoons! t tique style teleg tables and a er plates -not. Do you notiake it in ty tea-rooms? It’s part of tiqueness, I suppose. And instead of an ordinary ress t ea, and sen minutes getting it. You knoea— Cea, so    you could t’s er till you put tting almost exactly and. I could almost    a ‘piece’, as o call it, from t t gave me a most peculiar feeling t I ences and t if t simultaneously I o tell somebody t I’d been born    I beloo t I really felt) t to me. tea. t    if I    bee into one of t me.    titute. But in to speak. I said:

        ‘have you been in Lower Binfield long?’

        Sarted, looked surprised, and didn’t ansried again:

        ‘I used to live in Lower Binfleld myself, a good while ago.’

        Again no ans I couldn’t    of t oo muco go in for back-ers. Besides, s I rying to get off    elling , it    i . I paid t.

        I o t I’d been o, o kno I     a face I knes. It seemed as if toion.

        to to ery. to t I didn’t kno to find. I on    scytt tcre-ser ae one anot as if till singing at eac got er all. Born in ‘43 and ‘departed    en Ser, as usual. Ser died in ‘26.    a time old et    t t under a , and in tctle crosses. All goo dust. Old obacco-coloured teetiger, and    —not of any of t a slab of stone and God knoh.

        I found Mot. Botty good repair. ton    ttle    of t used to look like tead,    do you feel er ty years? I don’t kno I’ll tell you     of my mind. It’s as if ted somey, Moteapot, Fattle mealy, and acles and acure, a in some    seem to o do ood to    of a start.

        I looked over my s o be creeping hem.

        I strolled into t t time since I got back to Lo ly feeling, or rat in a different form. Because not t all ty, sis    of lig creeping up till got pe Ser. Sies and Og tones in till apted doo    te our peill knes of it by . Eveo u my memory. Lord knohe sermon.

        .,

        of t &

        upright..........................

        ..................................

        to e bene

        volences .......

        ...................................

        .......................beloved wife

        Amelia, by..............iffue feven

        daughters..........................

        I remembered o puzzle me as a kid. Used to wonder wheir S’s as F’s, and if so, why.

        tep beanding over me. It he vicar.

        But I mean t terton, ter of fact, ever since I could remember, but since 1904 or ts. I reized    oe we.

        reize me. I    tripper in a blue suit doing a bit of sigly started on talk—erested in arcecture, remarkable old building tions go back to Saxon times and so on and so forts, suco try, brass effigy of Sir Roderick Bole of Ne did I tell    I kne all already? Did I tell    I    I’d not only listeo en years and goo ion classes, but even beloo t Sesame and Lilies just to please . I merely follo t is five    t to say except t it doesn’t look it. From t t I set eyes on o let ranger. As soon as I detly could I dropped sixpen the Church Expenses box and bunked.

        But ao at last I’d found somebody I knew?

        Because ter ty years ually frig    !    suddenly taug time.

        I suppose old Betterton    sixty-five no y-five—my o age. e no reaky grey, like a s as soon as I sa struck me     of er all    so very old. As a boy, it occurred to me, all people over forty o me just    old    ty-five o me older ty-five seemed noy-five myself. It frightened me.

        So t’s o cy, I t as I made off bet a poor old     care a damn about my age. , but I’m strong and    to do. A rose smells to me no did y. A do I smell to t een, came up to pass    a tiny momentary look. No, nile. Only kind of e, like a y years wo    world from me, like an animal.

        I    back to ted a drink, but t open for anot for a bit, reading a Sp and Dramatic of tly t mige yearning to get off ed to s t, even if to eeter all, I t, if sy and I’m forty-five, t’s fair enouganding in front of ty fireplace, making believe to    I didn’t look so bad. A bit fat, no doubt, but distingue. A man of tockbroker. I put on my to at and said casually:

        ‘onderful June her we’re having.’

        It ty    it? Nor in t I met you somewhere before?’

        But it    a success. S ans    o you like a bullet. In t split sed I saaken out to dance-er, ao one of t myself oo. Ne or no ne, I COULDN’t pass for a stockbroker. Merely looked like a ercial traveller     of dougo te bar to    or two before dinner.

        t t used to    of taste in it because it    of cer. I asked the barmaid:

        ‘ill got the brewery?’

        ‘Bessemers? Oo, NO, sir! they’ve gorn. Oo, years ago—long before we e ‘ere.’

        S, er type of barmaid, ty-fivis arms told me t ake from taste, as a matter of fact. t bars ran round in a circle ments ile t see alk o kno a single one of t s even rew, wo he old days.

        ‘I used to live in Loold    he war.’

        ‘Before t look t old.’

        ‘See some ctle.

        ‘to’s tories, I suppose.’

        ‘ell, of course tly    tories. truefitt Stogs. But of course they’re making bombs nowadays.’

        I didn’t altoget    selling me about a young felloruefitt’s factory and sometimes came to told    togs, t uand, being easy to bine. And told me about tary aerodrome near alton—t ated for t seeing—and t moment arted talking about t ly to escape t of    I’d e    ’s in the.

        I said it tle said     gave he creeps. She said:

        ‘It doesn’t seem to do muc, after all said and done? And sometimes I lie a nig to myself, “ell, no o drop a bop of me!” And all todgers, selling you it’ll be all riguff to dig a ser uo it is,    a gas- mask on a baby?’

        ttle said    you ougo get into a    batill it    of a by-play on t of    into told t to get saucy, and t up t a couple more pints of old and mild. I took a suck at my beer. It uff. Bitter, t. And it ter, rigoo bitter, a kind of sulpaste. Co beer noo co beer. I found myself t Uncle Ezekiel,     A.R.P. and ts of sand you’re supposed to put te bombs out o my side of the bar I said:

        ‘By t the hall nowadays?’

        e alo call it ts name o uand.

        ‘the hall, sir?’

        ‘‘E means Binfield ‘Ouse,’ said ttle.

        ‘O you meant t’s Dr Merrall’s got Binfield house now.’

        ‘Dr Merrall?’

        ‘Yes, sir.    more ty patients up they say.’

        ‘Patients? ur into a al, or something?’

        ‘ell—it’s not orium. It’s mental patients, reely.    tal home.’

        A loony-bin!

        But after all, ?
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