Chapter XIII It was Eventually to be Mr. Hackbridge’s downfall that he was not an Amosite. Had he been even a Rechabite, the larger lapse could have been overlooked. But he was none of these. He worshipped in slack, desultory, Anglican fashion in St. George’s Parish Church, Hammersmith; and it was typical of the laxity of his religion that he regarded alcohol as no sin. That is not to say that he drank to excess; the temperance advocate’s picture of the drunkard was simply not in him. It was merely that he liked a little whisky before going home; and from time to time he would slip into the William the Fourth (which was far enough away from the shop for his entry not to be observed) to drink a solitary glass. Nothing could have been more moderate or more seemly than his behaviour on these occasions. But it was to be his undoing just the same. Ever since Mr. Morgan’s private talk he had been a little above himself. He no longer came immediately the assistants uttered their shrill “Sign please”; he came instead in his own time, keeping both the assistant and the customer waiting long enough to show that he was a person of some importance.
