CHAPTER XXVIII

THE LITTLE FIGURE IN BLACK

A season of intense depression, almost of melancholia, came to Douglas.
He grew more reserved than ever with his colleagues on the staff of the
Courier, who regretted his aloofness and would gladly have drawn him
into the ranks of their pleasant comradeship. He avoided the club,
where his absence was commented upon, and where he was in a fair way to
become a popular member. On the threshold of his ambitions, when the
way seemed fair before him, life had suddenly become distasteful. With
a fierce effort of concentration he continued to work at his novel,
which yet progressed but slowly. He spent much time sitting alone,
pondering upon subjects which, from such a standpoint as his present
one, seemed terrible enough. He had seen a good deal of the underneath
life of London, had himself suffered bitterly, and he began to think of
the city which now sheltered him as a city of lost souls drifting
onwards to a mysterious and awful goal. Though he had thrown away in
the moment of his revolt the shackles of his creed, the religious sense
was still strong in him. In those dark days it became almost a torment.
He felt that he too was going under. The springs of his ambition, his
lusty love of living and fighting grew weak, as physically his muscles
grew flaccid. He thought often of Strong--broken on the wheel, a
creature hopelessly lost. Was he drifting towards this? One night a
strange, sickly excitement came over him while he sat with the pen in
his hand. His head swam, and voices which he had almost forgotten rang
in his ears. Little specks of red fire danced before his eyes--he lost
hold upon his consciousness--he was doubtful even of his own identity.
He had become a unit, a lost unit, and for a moment or two he babbled
like a child. He set his teeth, walked swiftly up and down the room,