'
'It's unlikely that I should ever have got more than two hundred
pounds for a book; and, to have kept at my best, I must have been
content to publish once every two or three years. The position
was untenable with no private income. And I must needs marry a
wife of dainty instincts! What astounding impudence! No wonder
Fate pitched me aside into the gutter.'
They ate their ham and eggs, and exhilarated themselves with a
cup of chicory--called coffee. Then Biffen drew from the pocket
of his venerable overcoat the volume of Euripides he had brought,
and their talk turned once more to the land of the sun. Only when
the coffee-shop was closed did they go forth again into the foggy
street, and at the top of Pentonville Hill they stood for ten
minutes debating a metrical effect in one of the Fragments.
Day after day Reardon went about with a fever upon him. By
evening his pulse was always rapid, and no extremity of weariness
brought him a refreshing sleep. In conversation he seemed either
depressed or excited, more often the latter. Save when attending
to his duties at the hospital, he made no pretence of employing
himself; if at home, he sat for hours without opening a book, and
his walks, excepting when they led him to Clipstone Street, were
aimless.
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