And indeed that first vision of London, seen through the grimy windows of the cab, was terrible enough. The cab moved a little, stopped, moved again; it seemed that they would be there for ever and they exchanged no word. There were no buildings to be seen; a vast wall of darkness surrounded him and ever and again, out of the heart of it, a great cauldron of fire flamed and by the side of it there were wild, agitated faces—and again darkness. On every side of the stumbling cab there was noise—voices shouting, women screaming, the rumbling of wheels, the plunging of horses' hoofs; sometimes things brushed against their cab—once Peter thought that they were down because they were jerked right forward against the opposite seats. And then suddenly, in the most wonderful way, they would plunge into silence, a silence so deep and cavernous that it was more fearful than those other noises had been, and the yellow darkness seemed to crowd upon them with a closer eagerness and it was as though they were driving over the edge of the world. Then the noises returned, for a moment the fog lifted showing houses, rising like rocks from the sea sheer about them on every side, then darkness again and the cab stopped with a jerk.
“Ah, good,” said Mr. Zanti, rolling his red handkerchief into a ball. “'Ere we are, my young friend—Mr. Peter, after you, please.”
Before him a light faintly glimmered and towards this, after stumbling on the slippery pavement, he made his way. He found himself in a bookshop lighted with gas that hissed and spit like an angry cat; the shop was low and stuffy but its walls were covered with books that stretched into misty fog near the ceiling. Behind a dingy counter a man was sitting. This man struck Peter's attention at once because of the enormous size of his head and the amount of hair that covered it—starting out of the mist and obscurity of the shop, this head looked like some strange fungus, and from the heart of it there glittered two very bright eyes.
Peter, standing awkwardly in the middle of the shop, gazed at this head and was speechless.
Outside, Mr. Zanti could be heard disputing with the cabman.
“You can go and be damned—ze bags were not on ze outside—Zat is plenty for your pay and you be damned—”
The shop door closed with a bang shutting out the fog and Mr. Zanti filled the little bookshop. He seemed taller and larger than he had been in Cornwall and his voice was sharper. The head removed itself from the counter and Peter saw that it belonged to a small man with a hump who came forward to Mr. Zanti very humbly.
“Ah, Gottfried,” said Zanti, “you well?”
“Very, sir,” answered the little man, bowing a little and smiling; his voice was guttural with a very slight accent.
“This is Mr. Peter Westcott. 'E will work here and 'elp you with ze books. 'E is a friend of mine and you will be kind to him. Mr. Peter, zis is Herr Gottfried Hanz—I owe 'im much—ver' clever man.”