Where great love is not, a more definite and less satisfactory conclusion is reached.
As for Hurstwood, he was making a great fight against the difficulties of a changed condition.

He was too shrewd not to realize the tremendous mistake he had made, and appreciate that he had done well in getting where he was, and yet he could not help contrasting his present state with his former, hour after hour, and day after day.
Besides, he had the disagreeable fear of meeting old-time friends, ever since one such encounter which he made shortly after his arrival in the city.

It was in Broadway that he saw a man approaching him whom he knew.
There was no time for simulating non-recognition.

The exchange of glances had been too sharp, the knowledge of each other too apparent.

So the friend, a buyer for one of the Chicago wholesale houses, felt, perforce, the necessity of stopping.
"How are you ?" he said, extending his hand with an evident mixture of feeling and a lack of plausible interest.
"Very well," said Hurstwood, equally embarrassed.