Also the slush on the sidewalk had wet through his shoes, which probably was not good for his cough.
It was scarcely two in the afternoon, yet there remained so little daylight that the electricity burned in the shops along Fifth Avenue.
Through a smutty, grayish gloom, rain drove densely; his hat and waterproof coat were heavy with it, the bottoms of his trousers soaked.
Passing the Patroons Club it occurred to him that hot whiskey might extinguish his cough.

The liveried servants at the door, in the cloak-room--the page who took his order, the white-headed butler who had always personally served him, and who served him now, all hesitated and gazed curiously at him.

He paid no attention at the time but remembered it afterward.
For an hour he sat alone in the vast empty room before a fire of English cannel coal, taking his hot whiskey and lemon in slow, absent-minded gulps.

Patches of deep colour lay flat under his cheek-bones, his sunken abstracted eyes never left the coals.
The painted gaze of dead Presidents and Governors looked down at him from their old-time frames ranged in stately ranks along the oaken wainscot.

Over the mantel the amazing, Hebraic countenance of a moose leered at him out of little sly, sardonic little eyes, almost bantering in their evil immobility.
He had presented the trophy to the club after a trip somewhere, leaving the impression that he had shot it.