Bab Bab 3 · In the Toils

. In the Toils

"I beseech you let his lack of years be no impediment to let him

lack a reverend estimation, for I never knew so young a body with

so old a head."--_Merchant of Venice_, Act iv.

When Mr. Bultitude recovered his senses, which was not for a

considerable time, he found that he was being jolted along through a

broad well-lit thoroughfare, in a musty four-wheeler.

His head was by no means clear yet, and for some minutes he could hardly

be said to think at all; he merely lay back dreamily listening to the

hard grinding jar of the cab windows vibrating in their grooves.

His first distinct sensation was a vague wonder what Barbara might be

intending to give him for dinner, for, oddly enough, he felt far from

hungry, and was conscious that his palate would require the adroitest

witching.

With the thought of dinner his dining-room was almost inseparably

associated, and then, with an instant rush of recollection, the whole

scene there with the Garuda Stone surged into his brain. He shuddered as

he did so; it had all been so real, so hideously vivid and coherent

throughout. But all unpleasant impressions soon yielded to the delicious

luxury of his present security.

As his last conscious moment had been passed in his own dining-room, the

fact that he opened his eyes in a cab, instead of confirming his worst

fears, actually helped to restore the unfortunate gentleman's serenity;

for he frequently drove home from the city in this manner, and believed

himself now, instead of being, as was actually the case, in that

marvellous region of cheap photography, rocking-horses, mild stone

lions, and wheels and ladders--the Euston Road--to be bowling along

Holborn.

Now that he was thoroughly awake he found positive amusement in going

over each successive incident of his nightmare experience with the

talisman, and smiling at the tricks his imagination had played him.

"I wonder now how the dickens I came to dream such outrageous nonsense!"

he said to himself, for even his dreams were, as a rule, within the

bounds of probability. But he was not long in tracing it to the devilled

kidneys he had had at the club for lunch, and some curious old brown

sherry Robinson had given him afterwards at his office.

"Gad, what a shock the thing has given me!" he thought. "I can hardly

shake off the feeling even now."

As a rule, after waking up on the verge of a fearful crisis, the effect

of the horror fades swiftly away, as one detail after another evades a

memory which is never too anxious to retain them, and each moment

brings a deeper sense of relief and self-congratulation.

But in Paul's case, curiously enough, as he could not help thinking, the

more completely roused he became, the greater grew his uneasiness.

Perhaps the first indication of the truth was suggested to him by a

lurking suspicion--which he tried to dismiss as mere fancy--that he

filled rather less of the cab than he had always been accustomed to do.

To reassure himself he set his thoughts to review all the proceedings of

that day, feeling that if he could satisfactorily account for the time

up to his taking the cab, that would be conclusive as to the unreality

of any thing that appeared to have happened later in his own house. He

got on well enough till he came to the hour at which he had left the

office, and then, search his memory as he would, he could not remember

hailing any cab!

Could it be another delusion, too, or was it the fact that he had found

himself much pressed for time and had come home by the Underground to

Praed Street? It must have been the day before, but that was Sunday.

Saturday, then? But the recollection seemed too recent and fresh; and

besides, on Saturday, he had left at two, and had taken Barbara to see

Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke's performance.

Slowly, insidiously, but with irresistible force, the conviction crept

upon him that he had dined, and dined well.

"If I have dined already," he told himself, "I can't be going home to

dinner; and if I am not going home to dinner, what--what am I doing in

this cab?"

The bare idea that something might be wrong with him after all made him

impatient to put an end to all suspense. He must knock this scotched

nightmare once for all on the head by a deliberate appeal to his senses.

The cab had passed the lighted shops now, and was driving between

squares and private houses, so that Mr. Bultitude had to wait until the

sickly rays of a street lamp glanced into the cab for a moment, and, as

they did so, he put his feet up on the opposite seat and examined his

boots and trousers with breathless eagerness.

It was not to be denied; they were not his ordinary boots, nor did he

ever wear such trousers as he saw above them! Always a careful and

punctiliously neat person, he was more than commonly exacting concerning

the make and polish of his boots and the set of his trousers.

These boots were clumsy, square-toed, and thick-soled; one was even

patched on the side. The trousers were heavy and rough, of the kind

advertised as "wear-resisting fabrics, suitable for youths at school,"

frayed at the ends, and shiny--shamefully shiny--about the knees!

In hot despair he rapidly passed his hands over his body. It felt

unusually small and slim, Mr. Bultitude being endowed with what is

euphemistically termed a "presence," and it was with an agony rarely

felt at such a discovery that he realised that, for the first time for

more than twenty years, he actually had a waist.

Then, as a last resource, he took off his hat and felt for the broad,

smooth, egg-like surface, garnished by scanty side patches of thin hair,

which he knew he ought to find.

It was gone--hidden under a crop of thick close curling locks!

This last disappointment completely overcame him; he had a kind of short

fit in the cab as the bitter truth was brought home to him unmistakably.

Yes, this was no dream of a distempered digestion, but sober reality.

The whole of that horrible scene in the dining-room had really taken

place; and now he, Paul Bultitude, the widely-respected merchant of

Mincing Lane, a man of means and position, was being ignominiously

packed off to school as if he were actually the schoolboy some hideous

juggle had made him appear!

It was only with a violent effort that he could succeed in commanding

his thoughts sufficiently to decide on some immediate action. "I must be

cool," he kept muttering to himself, with shaking lips, "quite cool and

collected. Everything will depend on that now!"

It was some comfort to him in this extremity to recognise on the box the

well-known broad back of Clegg, a cabman who stabled his two horses in

some mews near Praed Street, and whom he had been accustomed to

patronise in bad weather for several years.

Clegg would know him, in spite of his ridiculous transformation.

His idea was to stop the cab, and turn round and drive home again, when

they would find that he was not to be got rid of again quite so easily.

If Dick imagined he meant to put up tamely with this kind of treatment,

he was vastly mistaken; he would return home boldly and claim his

rights!

No reasonable person could be perverse enough to doubt his identity when

once matters came to the proof; though at first, of course, he might

find a difficulty in establishing it. His children, his clerks, and his

servants would soon get used to his appearance, and would learn to look

below the mere surface, and then there was always the possibility of

putting everything right by means of the magic stone.

"I won't lose a minute!" he said aloud; and letting down the window,

leaned out and shouted "Stop!" till he was hoarse.

But Clegg either could not or would not hear; he drove on at full speed,

a faster rate of progress than that adopted by most drivers of

four-wheeled cabs being one of his chief recommendations.

They were now passing Euston. It was a muggy, slushy night, with a thin

brown fog wreathing the houses and fading away above their tops into a

dull, slate-blue sky. The wet street looked like a black canal; the

blurred forms, less like vehicles than nondescript boats, moving over

its inky surface, were indistinctly reflected therein; the gas-lights

flared redly through the murky haze. It was not a pleasant evening in

which to be out-of-doors.

Paul would have opened the cab-door and jumped out had he dared, but his

nerve failed him, and, indeed, considering the speed of the cab, the

leap would have been dangerous to a far more active person. So he was

forced to wait resignedly until the station should be reached, when he

determined to make Clegg understand his purpose with as little loss of

time as possible.

"I must pay him something extra," he thought; "I'll give him a sovereign

to take me back." And he searched his pockets for the loose coin he

usually carried about with him in such abundance; there was no gold in

any of them.

He found, however, a variety of minor and less negotiable articles,

which he fished out one by one from unknown depths--a curious

collection. There was a stumpy German-silver pencil case, a broken prism

from a crystal chandelier, a gilded Jew's harp, a little book in which

the leaves on being turned briskly, gave a semblance of motion to the

sails of a black windmill drawn therein, a broken tin soldier, some

Hong-Kong coppers with holes in them, and a quantity of little cogged

wheels from the inside of a watch; while a further search was rewarded

by an irregular lump of toffee imperfectly enfolded in sticky brown

paper.

He threw the whole of these treasures out of the window with

indescribable disgust, and, feeling something like a purse in a side

pocket, opened it eagerly.

It held five shillings exactly, the coins corresponding to those he had

pushed across to his son such a little while ago! It did not seem to him

quite such a magnificent sum now as it had done then; he had shifted his

point of view.

It was too clear that the stone must have carried out his thoughtless

wish with scrupulous and conscientious exactness in every detail. He had

wanted, or said he wanted, to be a boy again like Dick, and accordingly

he had become a perfect duplicate, even to the contents of the pockets.

Evidently nothing on the face of things showed the slightest difference.

Yet--and here lay the sting of the metamorphosis--he was conscious under

it all of being his old original self, in utter discordance with the

youthful form in which he was an unwilling prisoner.

By this time the cab had driven up the sharp incline, and under the high

pointed archway of St. Pancras terminus, and now drew up with a jerk

against the steps leading to the booking office.

Paul sprang out at once in a violent passion. "Here, you, Clegg!" he

said, "why the devil didn't you pull up when I told you? eh?"

Clegg was a burly, red-faced man, with a husky voice and a general

manner which conveyed the impression that he regarded teetotalism, as a

principle, with something more than disapproval.

"Why didn't I pull up?" he said, bending stiffly down from his box.

"'Cause I didn't want to lose a good customer, that's why I didn't pull

up!"

"Do you mean to say you don't know me?"

"Know yer?" said Clegg, with an approach to sentiment: "I've knowed yer

when you was a babby in frocks. I've knowed yer fust nuss (and a fine

young woman she were till she took to drinking, as has been the ruin of

many). I've knowed yer in Infancy's hour and in yer byhood's bloom! I've

druv yer to this 'ere werry station twice afore. Know yer!"

Paul saw the uselessness of arguing with him. "Then, ah--drive me back

at once. Let those boxes alone. I--I've important business at home which

I'd forgotten."

Clegg gave a vinous wink. "Lor, yer at it agin," he said with

admiration. "What a artful young limb it is! But it ain't what yer may

call good enough, so to speak, it ain't. Clegg don't do that no more!"

"Don't do what?" asked Paul.

"Don't drive no young gents as is a-bein' sent to school back agin into

their family's bosims," said Clegg sententiously. "You was took ill

sudden in my cab the larst time. Offal bad you was, to be sure--to hear

ye, and I druv' yer back; and I never got no return fare, I didn't, and

yer par he made hisself downright nasty over it, said as if it occurred

agin he shouldn't employ me no more. I durstn't go and offend yer par;

he's a good customer to me, he is."

"I'll give you a sovereign to do it," said Paul.

"If yer wouldn't tell no tales, I might put yer down at the corner

p'raps," said Clegg, hesitating, to Paul's joy; "not as it ain't cheap

at that, but let's see yer suffering fust. Why," he cried with lofty

contempt as he saw from Paul's face that the coin was not producible,

"y'ain't got no suffering! Garn away, and don't try to tempt a pore

cabby as has his livin' to make. What d'ye think of this, porter, now?

'Ere's a young gent a tryin' to back out o' going to school when he

ought to be glad and thankful as he's receivin' the blessin's of a good

eddication. Look at me. I'm a 'ard-workin' man. I am. I ain't 'ad no

eddication. The kids, they're a learnin' French, and free'and drorin,

and the bones on a skellington at the Board School, and I pays my

coppers down every week cheerful. And why, porter? Why, young master?

'Cause I knows the vally on it! But when I sees a real young gent a

despisin' of the oppertoonities as a bountiful Providence and a

excellent par has 'eaped on his 'ed, it--it makes me sick, it inspires

Clegg with a pity and a contemp' for such ingratitood, which he cares

not for to 'ide from public voo!"

Clegg delivered this harangue with much gesture and in a loud tone,

which greatly edified the porters and disgusted Mr. Bultitude.

"Go away," said the latter, "that's enough. You're drunk!"

"Drunk!" bellowed the outraged Clegg, rising on the box in his wrath.

"'Ear that. 'Ark at this 'ere young cock sparrer as tells a fam'ly man

like Clegg as he's drunk! Drunk, after drivin' his par in this 'ere

werry cab through frost and fine fifteen year and more! I wonder yer

don't say the old 'orse is drunk; you'll be sayin' that next! Drunk! oh,

cert'nly, by all means. Never you darken my cab doors no more. I shall

take and tell your par, I shall. Drunk, indeed! A ill-conditioned young

wiper as ever I see. Drunk! yah!"

And with much cursing and growling, Clegg gathered up his reins and

drove off into the fog, Boaler having apparently pre-paid the fare.

"Where for, sir, please?" said a porter, who had been putting the

playbox and portmanteau on a truck during the altercation.

"Nowhere," said Mr. Bultitude. "I--I'm not going by this train; find me

a cab with a sober driver."

The porter looked round. A moment before there had been several cabs

discharging their loads at the steps; now the last had rolled away

empty.

"You might find one inside the station by the arrival platform," he

suggested; "but there'll be sure to be one comin' up here in another

minute, sir, if you like to wait."

Paul thought the other course might be the longer one, and decided to

stay where he was. So he walked into the lofty hall in which the booking

offices are placed and waited there by the huge fire that blazed in the

stove until he should hear the cab arrive which could take him back to

Westbourne Terrace.

One or two trains were about to start, and the place was full. There

were several Cambridge men "going up" after the Christmas vacation, in

every variety of ulster; some tugging at refractory white terriers, one

or two entrusting bicycles to dubious porters with many cautions and

directions. There were burly old farmers going back to their quiet

countryside, flushed with the prestige of a successful stand under

cross-examination in some witness-box at the Law Courts; to tell and

retell the story over hill and dale, in the market-place and

bar-parlour, every week for the rest of their honest lives. There was

the usual pantomime "rally" on a mild scale, with real frantic

passengers, and porters, and trucks, and trays of lighted lamps.

Presently, out of the crowd and confusion, a small boy in a thick pilot

jacket and an immensely tall hat, whom Paul had observed looking at him

intently for some time, walked up to the stove and greeted him

familiarly.

"Hallo, Bultitude!" he said, "I thought it was you. Here we are again,

eh? Ugh!" and he giggled dismally.

He was a pale-faced boy with freckles, very light green eyes, long,

rather ragged black hair, a slouching walk, and a smile half-simpering,

half-impudent.

Mr. Bultitude was greatly staggered by the presumption of so small a boy

venturing to address him in this way. He could only stare haughtily.

"You might find a word to say to a fellow!" said the boy in an aggrieved

tone. "Look here; come and get your luggage labelled."

"I don't want it labelled," said Paul stiffly, feeling bound to say

something. "I'm waiting for a cab to take me home again."

The other gave a loud whistle. "That'll make it rather a short term,

won't it, if you're going home for the holidays already? You're a cool

chap, Bultitude! If I were to go back to my governor now, he wouldn't

see it. It would put him in no end of a bait. But you're chaffing----"

Paul walked away from him with marked coolness. He was not going to

trouble himself to talk to his son's schoolfellows.

"Aren't you well?" said the boy, not at all discouraged by his

reception, following him and taking his arm. "Down in the mouth? It is

beastly, isn't it, having to go back to old Grimstone's! The snow gave

us an extra week, though--we've that much to be thankful for. I wish it

was the first day of the holidays again, don't you? What's the matter

with you? What have I done to put you in a wax?"

"Nothing at present," said Paul. "I don't speak to you merely because I

don't happen to have the--ah--pleasure of your acquaintance."

"Oh, very well, then; I daresay you know best," said the other huffily.

"Only I thought--considering we came the same half, and have been chums,

and always sat next one another ever since--you might perhaps just

recollect having met me before, you know."

"Well, I don't," said Mr. Bultitude. "I tell you I haven't the least

idea what your name is. The fact is there has been a slight mistake,

which I can't stop to talk about now. There's a cab just driven up

outside now. You must excuse me, really, my boy, I want to go."

He tried to work his arm free from the close and affectionate grip of

his unwelcome companion, who was regarding him with a sort of admiring

leer.

"What a fellow you are, Bultitude!" he said; "always up to something or

other. You know me well enough. What is the use of keeping it up any

longer? Let's talk, and stop humbugging. How much grub have you brought

back this time?"

To be advised to stop humbugging, and be persecuted with such idle

questions as these, maddened the poor gentleman. A hansom really had

rolled up to the steps outside. He must put an end to this waste of

precious time, and escape from this highly inconvenient small boy.

He forced his way to the door, the boy still keeping fast hold of his

arm. Fortunately the cab was still there, and its late occupant, a tall,

broad man, was standing with his back to them paying the driver. Paul

was only just in time.

"Porter!" he cried. "Where's that porter? I want my box put on that cab.

No, I don't care about the luggage; engage the cab. Now, you little

ruffian, are you going to let me go? Can't you see I'm anxious to get

away?"

Jolland giggled more impishly than ever. "Well, you _have_ got cheek!"

he said. "Go on, I wish you may get that cab, I'm sure!"

Paul, thus released, was just hurrying towards the cab, when the

stranger who had got out of it settled the fare with satisfaction to

himself and turned sharply round.

The gas-light fell full on his face, and Mr. Bultitude recognised that

the form and features were those of no stranger--he had stumbled upon

the very last person he had expected or desired to meet just then--his

flight was intercepted by his son's schoolmaster, Dr. Grimstone himself!

The suddenness of the shock threw him completely off his balance. In an

ordinary way the encounter would not of course have discomposed him, but

now he would have given worlds for presence of mind enough either to

rush past to the cab and secure his only chance of freedom before the

Doctor had fully realised his intention, or else greet him affably and

calmly, and, taking him quietly aside, explain his awkward position with

an easy man-of-the-world air, which would ensure instant conviction.

But both courses were equally impossible. He stood there, right in Dr.

Grimstone's path, with terrified starting eyes and quivering limbs, more

like an unhappy guinea-pig expecting the advances of a boa, than a

British merchant in the presence of his son's schoolmaster! He was sick

and faint with alarm, and the consciousness that appearances were all

against him.

There was nothing in the least extraordinary in the fact of the Doctor's

presence at the station. Mr. Bultitude might easily have taken this

into account as a very likely contingency and have provided accordingly,

had he troubled to think, for it was Dr. Grimstone's custom, upon the

first day of the term, to come up to town and meet as many of his pupils

upon the platform as intended to return by a train previously specified

at the foot of the school-bills; and Paul had even expressly insisted

upon Dick's travelling under surveillance in this manner, thinking it

necessary to keep him out of premature mischief.

It makes a calamity doubly hard to bear when one looks back and sees by

what a trivial chance it has come upon us, and how slight an effort

would have averted it altogether; and Mr. Bultitude cursed his own

stupidity as he stood there, rooted to the ground, and saw the hansom (a

"patent safety" to him in sober earnest) drive off and abandon him to

his fate.

Dr. Grimstone bore down heavily upon him and Jolland, who had by this

time come up. He was a tall and imposing personage, with a strong black

beard and small angry grey eyes, slightly blood-tinged; he wore garments

of a semi-clerical cut and colour, though he was not in orders. He held

out a hand to each with elaborate geniality.

"Ha, Bultitude, my boy, how are you? How are you, Jolland? Come back

braced in body and mind by your vacation, eh? That's as it should be.

Have you tickets? No? follow me then. You're both over age, I believe.

There you are; take care of them."

And before Paul could protest, he had purchased tickets for all three,

after which he laid an authoritative hand upon Mr. Bultitude's shoulder

and walked him out through the booking hall upon the platform.

"This is awful," thought Paul, shrinking involuntarily; "simply awful.

He evidently has no idea who I really am. Unless I'm very careful I

shall be dragged off to Crichton House before I can put him right. If I

could only get him away alone somewhere."

As if in answer to the wish, the Doctor guided him by a slight pressure

straight along by the end of the station, saying to Jolland as he did

so, "I wish to have a little serious conversation with Richard in

private. Suppose you go to the bookstall and see if you can find out any

of our young friends. Tell them to wait for me there."

When they were alone the Doctor paced solemnly along in silence for some

moments, while Paul, who had always been used to consider himself a

fairly prominent object, whatever might be his surroundings, began to

feel an altogether novel sensation of utter insignificance upon that

immense brown plain of platform and under the huge span of the arches

whose girders were lost in wreaths of mingled fog and smoke.

Still he had some hope. Was it not possible, after all, that the Doctor

had divined his secret and was searching for words delicate enough to

convey his condolences?

"I wished to tell you, Bultitude," said the Doctor presently, and his

first words dashed all Paul's rising hopes, "that I hope you are

returning this term with the resolve to do better things. You have

caused your excellent father much pain in the past. You little know the

grief a wilful boy can inflict on his parent."

"I think I have a very fair idea of it," thought Paul, but he said

nothing.

"I hope you left him in good health? Such a devoted parent,

Richard--such a noble heart!"

At any other time Mr. Bultitude might have felt gratified by these

eulogies, but just then he was conscious that he could lay no claim to

them. It was Dick who had the noble heart now, and he himself felt even

less of a devoted parent than he looked.

"I had a letter from him during the vacation," continued Dr. Grimstone,

"a sweet letter, Richard, breathing in every line a father's anxiety and

concern for your welfare."

Paul was a little staggered. He remembered having written, but he would

scarcely perhaps have described his letter as "sweet," as he had not

done much more than enclose a cheque for his son's account and object to

the items for pew-rent and scientific lectures with the diorama as

excessive.

"But--and this is what I wanted to say to you, Bultitude--his is no

blind doting affection. He has implored me, for your own sake, if I see

you diverging ever so slightly from the path of duty, not to stay my

hand. And I shall not forget his injunctions."

A few minutes ago, and it would have seemed to Paul so simple and easy a

matter to point out to the Doctor the very excusable error into which he

had fallen. It was no more than he would have to do repeatedly upon his

return, and here was an excellent opportunity for an explanation.

But, somehow the words would not come. The schoolmaster's form seemed so

tremendous and towering, and he so feeble and powerless before him, that

he soon persuaded himself that a public place, like a station platform,

was no scene for domestic revelations of so painful a character.

He gave up all idea of resistance at present. "Perhaps I had better

leave him in his error till we get into the train," he thought; "then we

will get rid of that other boy, and I can break it to him gradually in

the railway carriage as I get more accustomed to him."

But in spite of his determination to unbosom himself without further

delay, he knew that a kind of fascinated resignation was growing upon

him and gaining firmer hold each minute.

Something must be done to break the spell and burst the toils which were

being woven round him before all effort became impossible.

"And now," said the Doctor, glancing up at the great clock-face on which

a reflector cast a patch of dim yellow light, "we must be thinking of

starting. But don't forget what I have said."

And they walked back towards the book-stalls with their cheery warmth

of colour, past the glittering buffet, and on up the platform, to a part

where six boys of various sizes were standing huddled forlornly together

under a gaslight.

"Aha!" said Dr. Grimstone, with a slight touch of the ogre in his tone,

"more of my fellows, eh? We shall be quite a party. How do you do, boys?

Welcome back to your studies."

And the six boys came forward, all evidently in the lowest spirits, and

raised their tall hats with a studied politeness.

"Some old friends here, Bultitude," said the Doctor, impelling the

unwilling Paul towards the group. "You know Tipping, of course; Coker,

too, you've met before--and Coggs. How are you, Siggers? You're looking

well. Ah, by the way, I see a new face--Kiffin, I think? Kiffin, this is

Bultitude, who will make himself your mentor, I hope, and initiate you

into our various manners and customs."

And, with a horrible dream-like sense of unreality, Mr. Bultitude found

himself being greeted by several entire strangers with a degree of

warmth embarrassing in the extreme.

He would have liked to protest and declare himself there and then in his

true colours, but if this had been difficult alone with the Doctor under

the clock, it was impossible now, and he submitted ruefully enough to

their unwelcome advances.

Tipping, a tall, red-haired, raw-boned boy, with sleeves and trousers he

had outgrown, and immense boots, wrung Paul's hand with misdirected

energy, saying "how-de-do?" with a gruff superiority, mercifully

tempered by a touch of sheepishness.

Coggs and Coker welcomed him with open arms as an equal, while Siggers,

a short, slight, sharp-featured boy, with a very fashionable hat and

shirt-collars, and a horse-shoe pin, drawled, "How are you, old boy?"

with the languor of a confirmed man about town.

The other two were Biddlecomb, a boy with a blooming complexion and a

singularly sweet voice, and the new-comer, Kiffin, who did not seem much

more at home in the society of other boys than Mr. Bultitude himself,

for he kept nervously away from them, shivering with the piteous

self-abandonment of an Italian greyhound.

Paul was now convinced that unless he exerted himself considerably, his

identity with his son would never even be questioned, and the danger

roused him to a sudden determination.

However his face and figure might belie him, nothing in his speech or

conduct should encourage the mistake. Whatever it might cost him to

overcome his fear of the Doctor, he would force himself to act and talk

ostentatiously, as much like his own ordinary self as possible, during

the journey down to Market Rodwell, so as to prepare the Doctor's mind

for the disclosures he meant to make at the earliest opportunity. He was

beginning to see that the railway carriage, with all those boys sitting

by and staring, would be an inconvenient place for so delicate and

difficult a confession.

The guard having warned intending passengers to take their seats, and

Jolland, who had been unaccountably missing all this time, having

appeared from the direction of the refreshment buffet, furtively

brushing away some suspicious-looking flakes and crumbs from his coat,

and contrived to join the party unperceived, they all got into a

first-class compartment--Paul with the rest.

He longed for moral courage to stand out boldly and refuse to leave

town, but, as we have seen, it was beyond his powers, and he temporised.

Very soon the whistle had sounded and the train had begun to glide

slowly out beyond the platform and arch, past the signal boxes and long

low sheds and offices which are the suburbs of a large terminus--and

then it was too late.