He came one day after school, and when we reached the house my mother was already seated before the urn. There were flowers on the table, and the linen was spotless. There was a silver teapot and sugar-basin given to my mother by our lodger on the occasion of his having completed two years’ residence in the house. His ingenuity in finding occasions whereon it might be considered suitable to make my mother and myself presents was quite remarkable. I was entrusted with the task of calling him in the morning. Hence it became necessary for me to have a watch, entirely, as he explained, to suit his convenience. In the same way a piano arrived one day—our own had been sold at my father’s death—and our lodger explained that it had been left to him by a distant relation. I gazed at it longingly as it disappeared into his sitting-room. After a day or two he said that he believed it would be spoilt unless it were played upon, and asked me as a favour to do so. Then, having come home once or twice as I was practising hard, he declared almost irritably that it was inconvenient and that he really thought considering the time he had been with us we might oblige him by having it in our sitting-room, but that of course if my mother objected there was nothing more to be said. He would have sold it had it not been in his cousin’s house for so many years. Needless to chronicle that the piano stood henceforward in our sitting-room. Our suspicions were somewhat aroused when the man who came to tune it gave as his opinion that the instrument could not be more than two years old, if that; in fact, he should have said it was brand-new. My mother was pleased for my sake that she was able to greet my friend from behind a silver teapot and sugar-basin. I was secretly conscious of the effect she produced on Grahame. He had, I am sure, believed—despite all my assurances to the contrary—that my mother was a Jewess, and he was not a little surprised to find a well-bred Englishwoman with a reserved and quite distinguished manner. Tea being over my mother kept us seated, whilst, almost unobserved, she placed every article from the table on the tray. She was full of manœuvres for minimising the bustle consequent on the want of a servant. I was rather nervous of the moment when she would rise and bear forth the tray. I had set her on such a pinnacle before my friend that I could not bear that he should see her otherwise than enthroned. I was painfully conscious that there is no snob like a boy. My mother, however, had foreseen everything. “Israel dear, Mr. Johnson has brought home a beautiful old Chinese cabinet. I am sure Mr. Hallward would like to see it.” Mr. Hallward—barely fifteen and a half and very flattered at being referred to as Mr. Hallward—expressed himself as most anxious, and we adjourned to the front room.