Sidney Benson Thorp

“ The poet started up, a prodigy of wrath.
"Ass!" he exclaimed. "It is life and death, I tell you. You call yourself a friend; will you do this nothing for me? I ask you for the last time."
"No." The answer was given in a tone of quiet obstinacy which, seldom heard by Freddy's intimates, never failed to carry conviction. "I will go no such fool's errand," he added, "for any man. And now I must be off. Good-bye. I'll look round again in a day or two, and I hope I shall find a rational creature."
For a moment, while he held the handle, he faltered; the spectacle might have moved commiseration ”

“ An older women, her companion, emerged and drew her away.
"How sweet!" murmured the student. "Wonder who she can be?" And he arose. *⁠*⁠*⁠*⁠* It was almost midnight when Freddy drove into Wickham Road, swelling with great words, primed with confidences.
About the door of 79 it surprised him to find a loose semi circular crowd, radiating from the sheen of police-buttons. With some difficulty he made his way to the officer, and inquired of him the reason of the assemblage. ”

“ Importunate came the hour when he must set forth once more to produce. A royalty on a limited edition may mount to a handsome dole of pocket-money, but it is not a chartered company. Longton's small capital had long since melted away ”

“ Above the din of perpetual harsh chatter, on this side and that, rose shrill voices into the extreme register of denunciation and vituperative challenge, buoyed higher to each response by antiphonal remonstrance in a lower octave. A mingled line of young men and women, in various stages of incipient intoxication, wavered past, and beneath the window of No. ”