Isaacson’s sincerity was sorely tested by his friendship at this period.  Original though he was, and full of the sensitive nature’s distaste for marching with the mob, he was ranged with the mob against Nigel in this affair of Mrs. Chepstow.  Yet Nigel claimed him as an ally, a kindred spirit.  He was not explicit, but in their fugitive intercourse he was perpetually implying.  It was “You and I,” and the rest of the world shut out.  Pity was working within him, chivalry was working, the generosity of his soul, but also its fighting obstinacy.  There was something in Nigel which loved to have its back against the wall.  He wanted to put Isaacson into the same pugnacious position, facing the overwhelming odds.  But the overwhelming odds were on the same side as the Doctor.  On the whole, Isaacson was not sorry that he had so few hours to spare.  For he did not know what to do.  Professional secrecy debarred him from telling Nigel what Mrs. Chepstow had said of herself.  What others said of her would never set Nigel against her, but would always incline him towards her.

So far Mrs. Chepstow and he were acquaintances.  But already the moment had come when Nigel was beginning to want of her more than mere acquaintanceship, and, because of this driving want of more, to ask himself whether he should require less.  His knowledge of the world might, or might not, have told him that with Mrs. Chepstow an unembarrassed friendship would be difficult.  That would have been theory.  Practice already taught him that the difficulty would probably prove insurmountable even by his enthusiasm and courage.  Were they friends?  Could they ever be friends?

Even while he asked himself the question, a voice within him answered, “No.”

Women who have led certain lives lose the faculty for friendship, if they ever possessed it.  Events have taught them, what instinct seems to teach many women, to look on men as more physical even than they are.  And such women show their outlook perpetually, in word, in look, in action, and in the indefinable nuances of manner which make a person’s atmosphere.  This outlook affects men, both shames them and excites them, acting on god and brute.  Neither shamed god nor brute with lifted head is in the mood for friendship.

Mrs. Chepstow had this instinctive outlook on male creation, and not even her delicate gifts as a comedienne could entirely disguise it.

At last Nigel reached a crisis of restlessness and uncertainty, which warned him that he must drift and delay no longer, but make up his mind quite definitely what course he was going to take.  He was not a man who could live comfortably in indecision.  He hated it, indeed, as an attribute of weakness.

He must “have it out” with himself.