It was a marvel to him how under these conditions he could turn out the amount of work he did.  For some nights were as noisy as the day.  There was no sort of repose about his next-door neighbour.  At times she coughed all night, at times she sang.  Or again, by sounds of sobbing he gathered that the poor wretch was not prospering in her trade.  Still, there were long and blessed intervals of peace when she roamed farther afield; intervals which might or might not be prolonged by alcoholic stupor after her return.  It may have been owing to these influences that he began to notice a decided deterioration in his prose.  Hanson had returned his last article.  He had worked poor Hanson’s geniality for all it was worth, and he felt that in common prudence he must withdraw from the Courier for a season.  Meanwhile his best prose, the articles he had by him, remained unpublished.  In war-time there was no market for such wares.

It was now October, and he had paid off but fifteen pounds of the hundred he still owed.  The lease of the little house at Ealing was out at Michaelmas; he had the five pounds provided every quarter by the furniture.  He sold his furniture and the last of his books, but when Dicky’s bill fell due in November he was still fifty pounds to the bad.  The fact that he had already paid three thousand and thirty-five would not prevent the sale and dispersal of part, and perhaps the most valuable part, of the Harden Library.  In that event he would get the money, not the books, and it was the books, all the books, he wanted.  He had persuaded himself that the actual redemption of the whole was the only legitimate means by which he could now approach Lucia Harden.  The mere repayment of the money was a coarser and more difficult method.  And now at the last moment the end, all but achieved, was as far from him as ever, supposing Dicky should refuse to renew his bill.

But Dicky did not refuse.  He gave him another two months.  No longer term could be conceded; but, yes, he would give him another two months.  “Just for the almighty fun of the thing.  If there’s one thing I like to see,” said Dicky, “it’s pluck.”  Dicky was more than ever sure of his game.  He argued rightly that Rickman would never have sold his books if he could have sold his articles or borrowed from a friend; that, as he had nothing else to sell or offer as security, his end was certain.  But it was so glorious to see the little fellow fighting his luck.  Dicky was willing to prolong the excitement for another two months.

For two months he fought it furiously.

He spent many hours of many days in trying to find work; a difficult thing when a man has cut himself loose from all his friends.  Strangers were not likely to consider his superior claims when the kind of work for which he was now applying could be done by anybody as well or better.  He counted himself uncommonly happy if he got a stray book to review or a job at the Museum, or if Vaughan held out the promise of giving him some translation by-and-by.