nearly midnight
Now ... he felt alone and very lonely , sick of heart and forlorn . There was , of course , Lynch , his partner in the Antipodes ; Whitaker was fond of Lynch , but not with the affection that a generous-spirited youth had accorded Peter Stark and Drummond -- a blind and unreasoning affection that asked no questions and made nothing of faults . The capacity for such sentiment was dead in him , as dead as Peter Stark , as dead as Drummond ... . It was nearly midnight , but the hour found Whitaker in no humour for bed or the emptiness of his room . He strolled into the lounge , sat down at a detached table in a corner , and ordered something to drink . There were not many others in the room , but still enough to mitigate to some extent his temporary horror of utter loneliness . He felt painfully the heaviness of his debt to the woman he had married .