What I had just seen and heard had so deepened my compassionate interest in my deluded friend that I took a summary leave, making my way directly to the house designated by this remarkable woman.  It was in an obscure corner of the opposite side of the town, and presented a sombre and squalid appearance.  An old woman in the doorway, on my inquiring for Theobald, ushered me in with a mumbled blessing and an expression of relief at the poor gentleman having a friend.  His lodging seemed to consist of a single room at the top of the house.  On getting no answer to my knock, I opened the door, supposing that he was absent, so that it gave me a certain shock to find him sitting there helpless and dumb.  He was seated near the single window, facing an easel which supported a large canvas.  On my entering he looked up at me blankly, without changing his position, which was that of absolute lassitude and dejection, his arms loosely folded, his legs stretched before him, his head hanging on his breast.  Advancing into the room I perceived that his face vividly corresponded with his attitude.  He was pale, haggard, and unshaven, and his dull and sunken eye gazed at me without a spark of recognition.  I had been afraid that he would greet me with fierce reproaches, as the cruelly officious patron who had turned his contentment to bitterness, and I was relieved to find that my appearance awakened no visible resentment.  “Don’t you know me?” I asked, as I put out my hand.  “Have you already forgotten me?”

He made no response, kept his position stupidly, and left me staring about the room.  It spoke most plaintively for itself.  Shabby, sordid, naked, it contained, beyond the wretched bed, but the scantiest provision for personal comfort.  It was bedroom at once and studio—­a grim ghost of a studio.  A few dusty casts and prints on the walls, three or four old canvases turned face inward, and a rusty-looking colour-box, formed, with the easel at the window, the sum of its appurtenances.  The place savoured horribly of poverty.  Its only wealth was the picture on the easel, presumably the famous Madonna.  Averted as this was from the door, I was unable to see its face; but at last, sickened by the vacant misery of the spot, I passed behind Theobald, eagerly and tenderly.  I can hardly say that I was surprised at what I found—­a canvas that was a mere dead blank, cracked and discoloured by time.  This was his immortal work!  Though not surprised, I confess I was powerfully moved, and I think that for five minutes I could not have trusted myself to speak.  At last my silent nearness affected him; he stirred and turned, and then rose and looked at me with a slowly kindling eye.  I murmured some kind ineffective nothings about his being ill and needing advice and care, but he seemed absorbed in the effort to recall distinctly what had last passed between us.  “You were right,” he said, with a pitiful smile, “I am a dawdler!  I am a failure!  I shall do nothing more in this