It wasn't in Tom Bingle to be mean, not even to
his worst enemy. Notwithstanding the fact that the young man had just
taken unto himself a wife, and was as poor as a church-mouse, the door
and the cupboard in his modest little flat were opened cheerfully to
the delinquent Uncle Joe, and be it said to the latter's discredit and
shame--he proceeded to impose upon the generosity of his nephew in a
manner that should have earned him a booting into the street. But
young Tom was patient, he was mild, he even seemed to enjoy being put
upon by the wretched bankrupt. The thing that touched his heart most
of all and caused him to overlook a great many shortcomings, was the
cruel, unfilial slap in the face that had been administered by the
three children of the man, and the crushing, bewildering effect it had
upon him.
It was Tom who virtually picked the once fastidious Joseph Hooper out
of the gutter, weeks after the smash, and took him under his puny
wing, so to speak, during a somewhat protracted period of
regeneration. The broken, shattered man became, for the time being,
the Bingle burden, and he was not by any means a light or pleasant
one.
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