As a
matter of fact, this liveliness was potential rather than
actual. Mr. Crossley was always intending to resume
the giddy ways of the years before he became a great
man, but was always so far behind in the important
things to be done and done at once that he was forced
to put off. However, his neckties and his shirts and his
flirtations, untrustworthy eyes kept him a reputation for
being one of the worst cases in Broadway. In vain did
his achievements show that he could not possibly have
time or strength for anything but work. He looked
like a rounder; he was in a business that gave endless
dazzling opportunities for the lively life; a rounder he
was, therefore.
He was about forty. At first glance, so vivid and
energetic was he, he looked like thirty-five, but at second
glance one saw the lines, the underlying melancholy signs
of strain, the heavy price he had paid for phenomenal
success won by a series of the sort of risks that make the
hair fall as autumn leaves on a windy day and make
such hairs as stick turn rapidly gray.
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