However, all this is a digression. We at length reached London, and
Derrick took a room above mine, now and then disturbing me with
nocturnal pacings over the creaking boards, but, on the whole,
proving himself the best of companions.

If I wrote till Doomsday, I could never make you understand how the
burning of his novel affected him--to this day it is a subject I
instinctively avoid with him--though the re-written 'At Strife' has
been such a grand success. For he did re-write the story, and that
at once. He said little; but the very next morning, in one of the
windows of our quiet sitting-room, often enough looking despairingly
at the grey monotony of Montague Street, he began at 'Page I,
Chapter I,' and so worked patiently on for many months to re-make as
far as he could what his drunken father had maliciously destroyed.
Beyond the unburnt paragraph about the attack on Mondisfield, he had
nothing except a few hastily scribbled ideas in his note-book, and
of course the very elaborate and careful historical notes which he
had made on the Civil War during many years of reading and research-
-for this period had always been a favourite study with him.

But, as any author will understand, the effort of re-writing was
immense, and this, combined with all the other troubles, tried
Derrick to the utmost. However, he toiled on, and I have always
thought that his resolute, unyielding conduct with regard to that
book proved what a man he was.



Chapter VIII.