I was annoyed with myself because
Clem's abandonment of me so much affected me. I wished I could cut
the rope and carelessly cast him adrift as he had cast me adrift, but
I could not. I never could make out and cannot make out what was the
secret of his influence over me; why I was unable to say, "If you do
not care for me I do not care for you." I longed sometimes for
complete rupture, so that we might know exactly where we were, but it
never came. Gradually our intercourse grew thinner and thinner,
until at last I heard that he had been spending a fortnight with some
semi-aristocratic acquaintance within five miles of me, and during
the whole of that time he never came near me. I met him in a railway
station soon afterwards, when he came up to me effusive and
apparently affectionate. "It was a real grief to me, my dear
fellow," he said, "that I could not call on you last month, but the
truth was I was so driven: they would make me go here and go there,
and I kept putting off my visit to you till it was too late."
Fortunately my train was just starting, or I don't know what might
have happened. I said not a word; shook hands with him; got into the
carriage; he waved his hat to me, and I pretended not to see him, but
I did see him, and saw him turn round immediately to some well-
dressed officer-like gentleman with whom he walked laughing down the
platform.
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