
concerns. Examining, volume by volume and with painful minuteness, the prizes
Godwin had carried off, he remarked fervently, in each instance, »I can see how
very interesting that is! So thorough, so thorough!« Even Charlotte was at
length annoyed, when Mr. Cusse had exclaimed upon the thoroughness of Ben
Jonson's works; she asked an abrupt question about some town affair, and so gave
her brother an opportunity of taking the books away. There was no flagrant
offence in the man. He spoke with passable accent, and manifested a high degree
of amiability; but one could not dissociate him from the counter. At the thought
that his sister might become Mrs. Cusse, Godwin ground his teeth. Now that he
came to reflect on the subject, he found in himself a sort of unreasoned
supposition that Charlotte would always remain single; it seemed so unlikely
that she would be sought by a man of liberal standing, and at the same time so
impossible for her to accept any one less than a gentleman. Yet he remembered
that to outsiders such fastidiousness must show in a ridiculous light. What
claim to gentility had they, the Peaks? Was it not all a figment of his own
self- Even in education Charlotte could barely assert a superiority to Mr.
Cusse, for her formal schooling had ended when she was twelve, and she had never
cared to read beyond the strait track of clerical inspiration.
    There were other circumstances which helped to depress his estimate of the
family dignity. His brother Oliver, now seventeen, was developing into a type of
young man as objectionable as it is easily recognised. The slow, compliant boy
had grown more flesh and muscle than once seemed likely, and his wits had begun
to display that kind of vivaciousness which is only compatible with a nature
moulded in common clay. He saw much company, and all of low intellectual order;
he had purchased a bicycle, and regarded it as a source of distinction, a means
of displaying himself before shopkeepers' daughters; he believed himself a
modest tenor, and sang verses of sentimental imbecility; he took in several
weekly papers of unpromising title, for the chief purpose of deciphering
cryptograms, in which pursuit he had singular success. Add to these
characteristics a penchant for cheap jewellery, and Oliver Peak stands
confessed.
    It appeared to Godwin that his brother had leapt in a few months to these
heights of vulgar accomplishment; each separate revelation struck unexpectedly
upon his nerves and severely tried his temper. When at length Oliver, waiting
for supper, began to dance grotesquely to an air which local talent had
