The fact remained, however, that I found myself in far closer sympathy with him than ever before.

After all that he had said, I should have had a heart of stone if it had not been stirred to profound pity.

I had seen an instance both of his spell-bound cowardice and of his almost degrading craft in extrication.
That in itself repelled me.

But it lost its value in the light that he had cast on the never-ceasing torment that consumed him.

At any rate he was at death-grips with himself, strangling the devils of fear and dishonour with a hand relentlessly certain.