'But gradually--little by little. One would never expect it all at once.' 'Ay, there we talk sense. But first, why hath Sir Peter behaved with this (apparent) harshness? I would not judge him hastily. Therefore I say, apparent.' 'Because he found out at last--my cousin Matthew told him--that I came here to play the fiddle. So he gave me the choice--either to give up the counting-house or to give up the music. And I gave up the counting-house, Tom. I don't care what happens so that I get out of the counting-house.' 'Good--lad--good.' 'And I drubbed my cousin--I paid him with his own stick. And here I am.' He took my hand, his honest face beaming with satisfaction. At that moment, his sister Alice came back from making some purchases in the Borough High Street. 'Alice my dear,' he said, 'Will has been turned out of house and home by his father--sent out into the streets without a penny.' Alice burst into tears. When I think of Alice at that moment, my heart swells, my eyes grow humid. She was then fifteen, an age when the child and the woman meet, and one knows not whether to expect the one or the other. When Alice burst into tears it was the child who wept: she had always loved me with a childish unconsciousness: she was only beginning to understand that I was not her brother. You know how sweet a flower will sometimes spring up in the most unlovely spot. Well: in this place, close to the Dog and Duck, with prodigals and rakes and painted Jezebels always before her eyes, this child grew up sweet and tender and white as the snow. I have never known any girl upon whom the continual sight--not to be concealed--of gross vice produced so little effect: it was as if the eyes of her soul involuntarily closed to the meaning of such things. Such sweetness, such purity, was stamped upon her face then as afterwards. Never, surely, was there a face that showed so plain and clear to read that the thoughts behind it were not earthly or common. 'It is the soul of music that possesses her,' said her brother once. 'She has imbibed that soul day by day. Will, 'tis a saintly child. Sometimes I fear that she may be carried away like Elijah.' Well, when I saw those tears, I was seized with a kind of joyful compassion and, so to speak, happy shame, to think that those tears were for me. I drew her gently and kissed her. 'Why, nothing better could have happened to him. Thou little simpleton,' said her brother. Warming up with his subject, he became eloquent. 'He shall do much better--far better--than if he had stayed in the counting-house. He shall not be weighed down with a load of riches: he shall have to work in order to live--believe me, Will, Art must be forced by necessity: where there is no necessity there is no Art: when riches creep in, Art becomes a toy. Because he must work, therefore he will be stimulated to do great things. He shall never set his mind upon growing rich: he shall remain poor.'