Read "The Victim and the Worm" by Phyllis Bottome online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
It was at this point in her meditations that Prendergast moved. He wanted attention and at last he received it. Miss Strickland made up the fire and brought him a little warm milk with a dash of brandy in it. Prendergast responded to the stimulant and began to wander restlessly about the room. He could not make up his mind what he wanted. He moved about vaguely and stiffly as one who is practising the art of walking. His desires broke in him; and Miss Strickland, with a divine patience gratified in turn and without hurry, each of his passing fancies.
No one who knew Onoria Strickland as she was to the world, to her pupils, or even to her friends, could have believed in this tender, ministering Onoria, carrying out with anxious solicitude the whims of an old dog.