He wore no vest, and the old cutaway coat, fastened by the single remaining button, exposed his shirt to view, abominably filthy, bulging at the waist like a blouse.

The "blue pants," held up by a strap, were all foul with mud and grease and paint, and there hung about him a certain odour, that peculiar smell of poverty and of degradation, the smell of stale clothes and of unwashed bodies.
"Well ?" said Geary abruptly.
Vandover put the tips of his fingers to his lips and rolled his eyes about the room, avoiding Geary's glance; then he dropped them to the floor again, looking at the pattern in the carpet.
"Well," repeated Geary, irritated, "you know I haven't got all the time in the world." All at once Vandover began to cry, very softly, snuffling with his nose, his chin twitching, the tears running through his thin, sparse beard.
"Ah, get on to yourself!" shouted Geary, now thoroughly disgusted.

"Quit that! Be a man, will you?
Stop that! do you hear ?" Vandover obeyed, catching his breath and slowly wiping his eyes with the side of his hand.
"I'm no good!" he said at length, wagging his head and blinking through his tears.

"I'm--I'm done for and I ain't got no money; yet, of course, you see I don't mean no offence.

What I want, you see, is to be a man and not give in and not let the wolf get me, and then I'll go back to Paris.