Dusk

Norman Gortsby sat on a seat in the park. Hyde Park Corner, with its noise of traffic, lay immediately to the right. It was about thirty minutes past six on an early March evening, and dusk had fallen heavily over the scene, dusk with some faint moonlight and many street lamps. There was a wide emptiness over road and pavement, and yet there were many figures moving silently through the half-light, or sitting on seats and chairs.
The scene pleased Gortsby and suited his mood. Dusk, in his opinion, was the hour of the defeated. Men and women, who had fought the battle of life and lost, who hid their dead hopes from the eyes of the curious, came out in this hour, when their old clothes and bent shoulders and unhappy eyes might pass unnoticed.
On the seat by Gortsby‟s side sat a rather old gentleman with a look of defiance that was probable the last sign of self-respect in a man who had stopped defying successfully anybody or anything. As he rose to go, Gortsby imagined him returning to a home where he was of no importance, or to some uncomfortable lodging where his ability to pay his weekly rent was the beginning and end of the interest which he caused.