Palliser did not reply. He moved awkwardly over to the window and stood there for a while looking out into the street. Somehow the young fellow did not like to go away directly as though acknowledging that he was snubbed. For a while there was silence, except for a sudden burst of laughter from the men at the farther window. “By-the-way, Gildy,” said Palliser, as though suddenly recollecting something, “I was down at the Mountain Brook sale yesterday. Dorman-Webster’s man kind of knocked your man out, didn’t he, eh?”
Gilderman aroused himself almost violently. Why couldn’t the man let him alone. “See here, Palliser,” he said, “I don’t want to be rude, but I ain’t feeling well, and I wish you’d let me alone. I’ve got a headache, and don’t feel well.”
“Bilious?” inquired Palliser.
“Oh, I don’t know. I just want to be let alone–that’s all.”
“Oh, all right. I’ll let you alone,” said Palliser, and then he moved away and joined the group at the farther window, and presently Gilderman heard his high tenor voice sounding through the distant talk.
Again Gilderman sat by himself, feeling very miserable. He was ashamed of himself for being so angry, and yet he could not repent it. What should he do? He did not want to go home at this hour of the day; it would be very dull and stupid. And yet if he stayed any longer at the club all the men would be presently coming in, and he knew perfectly well that each would have something in turn to say either about the yacht-race or the Mountain Brook sale. He could not bear it. Where could he go to escape?
Then suddenly, for some unaccountable reason, the thought of the face of Him whom he had seen the day before flashed upon his mind. Was there any truth at all in what was said about Him? Maybe that Man could help him. Why not go and find Him and speak to Him? A dull, latent acknowledgment of the absurdity of the sudden notion that had seized him lay inertly beneath the thought, but the thought itself had somehow seized upon him very closely, just as it had seized upon him the day before. Why not go and find this strange Man and talk with Him? Anyhow, it would be something to do to distract him from thinking about his disappointments, and he would escape the annoyance of meeting the men as they came into the club. Maybe to-morrow, after he had had a good night’s sleep, he could better bear meeting and answering them. Just now this other thing would give him something to do.
He aroused himself and jerked back his chair. He looked at his watch and saw that it was half-past twelve. Then he went up into the dining-room and ordered himself a breakfast. As he sat looking up, passively, at Norcott’s great picture of the nude Venus surrounded by a flock of naked, fluttering Cupids, he again inertly made up his mind that he would go down to Brookfield by the two-twenty train. “Anyhow,” he repeated to himself, “it will give me something to do.” Then the waiter came, bringing the cocktail that he had ordered.