noon
Presently he went away without taking leave of Mr. Dosson and Delia . `` Why he acts just like Mr. Flack , '' said the old man when they discovered that the interview in the dining-room had come to an end . The next day was a bad one for Charles Waterlow , his work in the Avenue de Villiers being terribly interrupted . Gaston Probert invited himself to breakfast at noon and remained till the time at which the artist usually went out -- an extravagance partly justified by the previous separation of several weeks . During these three or four hours Gaston walked up and down the studio while Waterlow either sat or stood before his easel . He put his host vastly out and acted on his nerves , but this easy genius was patient with him by reason of much pity , feeling the occasion indeed more of a crisis in the history of the troubled youth than the settlement of one question would make it . Waterlow 's compassion was slightly tinged with contempt , for there was being settled above all , it seemed to him , and , alas , in the wrong sense , the question of his poor friend 's character .