As Burton looked around him, his distaste grew.

It seemed impossible that he had ever existed for an hour amid such an environment.

The prospect of the future was suddenly hugely distasteful.
Very slowly he changed his coat and climbed on to his worn horsehair stool, without exchanging his usual facetious badinage with the remaining member of the staff.

The office-boy, who had thought of something good to say, rather resented his silence.

It forced him into taking the initiative, a position which placed him from the first at a disadvantage.
"Any luck with the Yank, Mr.Burton ?" he inquired, with anxious civility.
Burton shook his head.
"None at all," he confessed.