Darrel recognised that it was impossible to write while in this vein, so he threw down his pen in despair, and wandered forth on his nightly quest for adventures. But the spirit to seek them did not move him, and in place of observing the life around him, he turned his eyes inward to contemplate the loved image of Maria Sandoval. Disappointed, worried, and racked with a thousand doubts, this lover of a day turned homeward, where he retired to bed and did his best to sleep. For the most part of the night he courted slumber in vain, but towards morning exhausted nature claimed her rights, and Darrel slept heavily until ten o'clock. While he was idling over his breakfast, with a tired face and no appetite, Roderick Blake was announced, and entered fresh as a rose to greet his friend.
"How are you my boy?" said the Irishman, who was in exuberant spirits. "You see, I haven't lost much time in looking you up. Breakfast, is it? Ham, eggs, and fish; a mighty good notion of a meal it is. Faith, I don't mind assisting you to clear the table."
"Sit down and welcome. I haven't got any appetite myself," said Darrel.
Blake required no second invitation, but, taking off his gloves, drew a chair up to the table and did wonders as a trencherman. The food melted like snow before his healthy appetite, and all the time he was chatting and laughing and making himself generally agreeable. His sunny clean-shaven face twinkled all over with humour, and his incessant flow of conversation, more or less trivial, did much to raise Darrel's spirits. He even acknowledged the service Blake had done him in banishing care.
"And I'm glad to see," he added, "that you have not lost the appetite for which you were renowned at school."
"Faith, no! but it's little chance I've had of satisfying that appetite," replied Blake airily.
"What! have you been hard up?"
"No; but I'm hard up now."
"Yet you talk of marrying," said Frank reprovingly.
"Not at present. Lydia will wait till I am rich," replied the other. "We are both young and can wait."