He turned from the window to look at the dark little room, groped his way to the chest of drawers, and lighted a candle.  Its flame sputtered, then settled and burned unwaveringly.  Here in London the nights seemed as stuffy as the days; there was no life or freshness, no movement of the air; it was as if the warm breath of the crowd rose upward and nothing less than a balloon would allow one to escape from its taint.  But he noticed that even at this slight elevation he had got free from the noise of the traffic.  It would continue—­a crashing roar—­for hours, and yet it was now scarcely perceptible.  Listening attentively he heard it—­just a crackling murmur, a curious muffled rhythm, as of drums beaten by an army of drummers marching far away.

When he got into bed and blew out his candle, the rectangle of the window became brighter.  After a little while he fancied that he could distinguish two or three stars shining very faintly in the patch of sky above the sashes; and again thinking of remoteness, immensity, infinity, he experienced a curious physical sensation of contracting bulk, as though all his body had grown and was steadily growing smaller.  Very strong this sensation, and, unless one wrestled with it firmly, translating itself in the mental sphere as a vaguely distressful notion that one was nothing but a tiny insect at war with the entire universe.

Day after day he spent his time in the same manner at the G.P.O.—­asking questions of clerks, lounging in stone corridors, sitting on wooden benches, thinking that the hour was coming and finding that it did not come.  He was one of a weary regiment of people waiting for interviews.  Clerks behind counters of inquiry offices hunted him up in pigeon-holes, looked for him in files and on skewers.  “Oh, yes, let’s see.  You say you’re the man from Rodchurch!  That’s north or midlands, isn’t it?  You must ask in Room 45....  What say?  Down south, is it?  Then you’re quite right to ask here.  No, we haven’t heard any more about it since yesterday.”

At the end of each fruitless day he emerged from the vast place of postponement feeling exhausted, dazed, stupefied.  The sunlight made him blink.  He stood holding his hat so as to shade his eyes.

Then after a few minutes, as he plodded along Queen Victoria Street, his confusion passed away, and he observed things with a clear understanding.  It was a lovely evening really and truly, and these ponderous omnibuses were all carrying people home because the day’s work was done.  The streets were clean and bright; and there was plenty of gayness and joy—­for them as could grab a share of it.  He noticed fine private carriages drawn up round corners, waiting for prosperous tradesmen; young men with tennis-bats in their hands, taking prodigiously long strides, eager to get a game of play before dusk; girls who went by twos and threes, chattering, laughing, making funny short quick steps of it, like as if on the dance to reach sweethearts and green lanes.  A man selling a mechanical toy—­sort of a tin frog that jumped so soon as you put it down—­made him smile indulgently.