Gedge, an excellent workman, set up as a contractor.

He took my modest home under his charge.

A leaky tap, a broken pane, a new set of bookshelves, a faulty drainpipe--all were matters for Gedge.

I abhorred his politics but I admired his work, and I continued, with Mrs.Marigold's motherly aid, to make much of Phyllis.
Gedge, for queer motives of his own, sent her to as good a school as he could afford, as a matter of fact an excellent school, one where she met girls of a superior social class and learned educated speech and graceful manners.

Her holidays, poor child, were somewhat dreary, for her father, an anti-social creature, had scarce a friend in the town.
Save for here and there an invitation to tea from Betty or myself, she did not cross the threshold of a house in Wellingsford.