“We can travel without a ship,” said Oro.
I grew alarmed, and suggested that Bastin or Bickley would be a much better companion than I should in my present weak state.
“An empty-headed man, or one who always doubts and argues, would be useless,” he replied sharply. “You shall come and you only.”
I expostulated; I tried to get up and fly—which, indeed, I did do, in another sense.
But Oro fixed his eyes upon me and slowly waved his thin hand to and fro above my head.
My senses reeled. Then came a great darkness.
They returned again. Now I was standing in an icy, reeking fog, which I knew could belong to one place only—London, in December, and at my side was Oro.
“Is this the climate of your wonderful city?” he asked, or seemed to ask, in an aggrieved tone.
I replied that it was, for about three months in the year, and began to look about me.
Soon I found my bearings. In front of me were great piles of buildings, looking dim and mysterious in the fog, in which I recognised the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey, for both could be seen from where we stood in front of the Westminster Bridge Station. I explained their identity to Oro.