E. Phillips Oppenheim

The contrast in personal appearance between the two men, having regard to their relative positions, was a significant thing. The caller, who had just been summoned from the waiting-room, and was standing before the other's table, hat in hand, a little shabby, with ill-brushed hair and doubtful collar, bore in his countenance many traces of the wild and irregular life which had reduced him at this moment to the position of suppliant. His complexion was pale almost to ghastliness, and in his deep-set, sunken eyes there was more than a suggestion of recklessness. He was so nervous that his face twitched as he stood there waiting, and the fingers which held his hat trembled. His lips were a little parted, his breathing was scarcely healthy. There was something about his whole appearance indicative of failure. The writing upon his forehead was the writing of despair.

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