Henry Stimpson was naturally deputed to collect the money. Stimpson was an indefatigable man, a laborious Civil Servant who worked from 10 till 7.30 every day (and took his lunch at the office), yet was not only ready but pleased to spend his evenings and his week-ends, canvassing for subscriptions, writing whips for meetings, or working out elaborate calculations of the amount due to Mrs. Ambrose in money and kind on her resigning from the communal kitchen after paying the full subscription and depositing a ham in the Committee's charge which had been cooked by mistake and sent to Mrs. Vincent. He genuinely enjoyed this kind of task, and he did it very, very well. Henry Stimpson duly waited on the Byrnes and explained the position. Stephen Byrne had read the articles in _I Say_, and Margery had read them. And a gloom had fallen upon Stephen, for which Margery was unable wholly to account as a symptom of solicitude for his friend's troubles--especially as they never seemed to see each other nowadays. To her knowledge they had not met at all since the summer holidays. Nor had they. They avoided each other. This resurrection of the Emily affair, these articles and the new publicity, and now on top of that the prospect of a libel action, was to Stephen like a slap in the face. He had almost forgotten his old anxieties in the absorption of work and the soothing atmosphere of his new resolutions. But he would not go to John; he had been lucky before; he might be lucky again; he would wait. Old John might be trusted to do nothing precipitate. So he promised to subscribe to the fund for the defence of John Egerton's good name, and Stimpson went away. The money was to be collected by that day week, and on the following Thursday there would be a general meeting to consider a plan of campaign. Stimpson's eyes as he spoke of "a general meeting" were full of quiet joy. And Stephen went on with his work--very slowly now, but he went on. The poem was nearly finished; he had only to polish it a little. But he sat now for long minutes glowering and frowning over his paper, staring out of the window, staring at nothing. Margery, watching him, wondered yet more what work he was at, and what was the secret of this gloom. She began to think that the two things might be connected; he might be attempting some impossible task; he might be overworked and stale. This had happened before. But in his worst hours of artistic depression he had never looked so black as sometimes she saw him now. And she noticed that he tried to conceal this mood from her; he would manufacture a smile if he caught her watching him. And that, too, was unusual.