And he would see the admiring gang slap Billy on the back, and hear
"Good owd Billy!" and never a word of thanks to him. Then, knowing
Billy to be a liar, he would tell him so, yelping shrilly, in
Buttonesque vernacular (North and South):

"This morning tha said it was five to one on Sheffield United."

"Listen to Susie!"

The parasitic urchins would yell at the witticism--the eternal
petitio principii of childhood, which Billy, secure in his cohort
from bloody nose, felt justified in making. And Paul Kegworthy, the
rag of a newspaper crumpled tight in his little hand, would watch
them disappear and wonder at the paradox of life. In any sphere of
human effort, so he dimly and childishly realized, he could wipe out
Billy Goodge. He had a soul-reaching contempt for Billy Goodge, a
passionate envy of him. Why did Billy hold his position instead of
crumbling into dust before him? Assuredly he was a better man than
Billy. When, Billy duce et auspice Billy, the gang played at pirates
or Red Indians, it was pitiful to watch their ignorant endeavours.
Paul, deeply read in the subject, gave them chapter and verse for
his suggestions. But they heeded him so little that he would turn
away contemptuously, disdaining the travesty of the noble game, and
dream of a gang of brighter spirits whom he could lead to glory.
Paul had many such dreams wherewith he sought to cheat the realities
of existence: but until the Great Happening the dream was not better
than the drink: after it came the Vision Splendid.

The wonderful thing happened all because Maisie Shepherd, a slip of
a girl of nineteen, staying at St. Luke's Vicarage, spilled a bottle