CHAPTER 25.
Again came springtime, and, as he stood behind the counter, Warburton thought of all that was going on in the world he had forsaken.
Amusements for which he had never much cared haunted his fancy; feeling himself shut out from the life of grace and intellect, he suffered a sense of dishonour, as though his position resulted from some personal baseness, some crime.

He numbered the acquaintances he had dropped, and pictured them as mentioning his name--if ever they did so--with cold disapproval.

Godfrey Sherwood had ceased to write; it was six months since his last letter, in which he hinted a fear that the Irish enterprise would have to be abandoned for lack of capital.

Even Franks, good fellow as he was, seemed to grow lukewarm in friendship.

The painter had an appointment for a Sunday in May at Will's lodgings, to smoke and talk, but on the evening before he sent a telegram excusing himself.