Our Friend the Charlatan by George Gissing
page 52 of 538 (09%)
page 52 of 538 (09%)
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length entered his club. In the library sat only one man, sunk in an
easy chair, busied with a book. It was Lord Dymchurch; at Lashmar's approach, he looked up, smiled, and rose to take the offered hand. "I disturb you," said Dyce. "There's no denying it," was the pleasant answer, "but I am quite ready to be disturbed. You know this, of course?" He showed Spencer's "The Man versus the State." "Yes," answered Dyce, "and I think it a mistake from beginning to end." "How so?" Lord Dymchurch was about thirty, slight in build, rather languid in his movements, conventionally dressed but without any gloss or scrupulous finish, and in manners peculiarly gentle. His countenance, naturally grave, expressed the man of thought rather than of action; its traits, at the same time, preserved a curious youthfulness, enhanced by the fact of his wearing neither moustache nor beard; when he smiled, it was with an almost boyish frankness, irresistible in its appeal to the good will of the beholder. Yet the corners of his eyes were touched with the crow's foot, and his hair began to be brindled, tokens which had their confirmation on brow and lip as often as he lost himself in musing. He had a soft voice, habitually subdued. His way of talking inclined to the quietly humorous, and was as little self-assertive as man's talk can be; but he kept his eyes fixed on anyone who conversed with him, and that |
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