He did not pose before himself as a victim to circumstance. Could he have done so, he might have found some poor consolation. His criminal folly lay as much upon his soul as its punishment. Again, it had not been a grand stroke of villainy requiring for its execution a masterly coolness and genius for which he might at least have had an intellectual admiration. But it had been of the same petty sort as that of the shop-boy led astray by low turf associates, who pilfers day by day from his master’s till, hoping the luck will turn and enable him to replace the stolen shillings. The difference had been merely one of degree. His operations had been on a larger scale, his vices more fastidious, his circle of loose friends more aristocratic. But he had had the same contemptible motives for his crime, and the same contemptible excuses. He spared himself no arrow of self-scorn. Latterly, through sheer weariness, he had grown apathetic, taking his self-abasement as one of the conditions of life. A man is not physiologically capable of continuous outburst. But now the iron had entered deep into his soul, causing him to writhe in torment. What would be the end? The question haunted him, and yet it seemed scarcely worth consideration. There was no employment to be obtained by such as he. He would eke out his small capital as far as possible, and when that was exhausted, he could put an end to his worthless life. Or would his cowardice drag him down among the class of habitual criminals, lead him to crime as a means of livelihood? He shuddered, remembering his short spell of agony in the cell of yesterday. The hours passed. Towards evening he dressed himself and went out to a dingy Italian restaurant near Victoria station, where he usually dined. On coming out again into the street he hesitated for some time as to what he should do next. He thought of Yvonne with wistful longing, but had not the courage to go and seek her. The sense of degradation was too strong upon him. He shrank with morbid sensitiveness from taking advantage of her guilelessness by bringing his contamination into her presence. For, paradoxical as it may seem, an instinctive pride still remained in the man. Had he chosen to lay it aside, doubtless more than one of his former friends would have consented to receive him on some sort of terms of acquaintanceship. But he had sought out none, and if chance brought him into sight of a familiar face in the street, he effaced himself and hurried on. Yvonne was the only figure out of the past with whom he had communicated. And now he had cut himself adrift from her.