ank inaction. It was a difficult
point to decide, for it seemed to come in appropriately at this point in
his story, and he did not know whether to leave it as it stood, change
it round a bit, or take it out altogether. It might just spoil its
chances of being accepted: editors were such clever men. But, to rewrite
the sentence was a grind, and he was so tired and sleepy. After all,
what did it matter? People who were clever would force a meaning into
it; people who were not clever would pretend--he knew of no other
classes of readers. He would let it stay, and go on with the action of
the story. He put his head in his hands and began to think hard.

His mind soon passed from thought to reverie. He fell to wondering when
his friends would find work and relieve him of the burden--he
acknowledged it as such--of keeping them, and of letting another man
wear his best clothes on alternate Sundays. He wondered when his "luck"
would turn. There were one or two influential people in New York whom
he could go and see if he had a dress suit and the other conventional
uniforms. His thoughts ran on far ahead, and at the same time, by a sort
of double process, far behind as well. His home in the "old country"
rose up before him; he saw the lawn and the cedars in sunshine; he
looked through the familiar windows and saw the clean, swept rooms. His
story began to suffer; the psychological masterpiece would not make much
progress unless he pulled up and dragged his thoughts back to the
treadmill. But he no longer cared; once he had got as far as that cedar
with the sunshine on it, he never could get back again. For all he
cared, the troublesome sentence might run away and get into someone
else's pages, or be snuffed out altogether.

There came a gentle knock at the door, and Blake started. The knock was
repeated louder. Who in the world could it be at this late hour of the
night? On the floor above, he remembered, there lived another
Englishman, a foolish, second-rate creature, who sometimes came in and
made himself objectionable with endless and silly chatter. But he was an
Englishman for all that, and Blake always tried to treat him with
politeness, realising that he was lonely in a strange land. But
to-night, of all people in the world, he did not want to be bored with
Perry's cackle, as he called it, and the "Come in" he gave in answer to
the second knock had no very cordial sound of welcome in it.

However, the door opened in res