It was not till the morning of polling day itself that Courtier left Monkland Court.

He had already suffered for some time from bad conscience.

For his knee was practically cured, and he knew well that it was Barbara, and Barbara alone, who kept him staying there.
The atmosphere of that big house with its army of servants, the impossibility of doing anything for himself, and the feeling of hopeless insulation from the vivid and necessitous sides of life, galled him greatly.

He felt a very genuine pity for these people who seemed to lead an existence as it were smothered under their own social importance.

It was not their fault.