At one point he faltered, but that was a matter of expediency rather than of courage.

He searched and selected, as he went along the street, among phrases that would convey his disaster to Dora Milburn.
Just at that point, the turning to his own office, he felt it hard luck that Alfred Hesketh should meet and want a word with him.

Hesketh had become tolerable only when other things were equal.

Lorne had not seen him since the night of his election, when his felicitations had seemed to stand for very little one way or another.

His manner now was more important charged with other considerations.