“Of course you’ll drive,” he remarked to his companion, as he clambered on the vehicle.
“I drive!” cried Pitman. “I never did such a thing in my life. I cannot drive.”
“Very well,” responded Michael with entire composure, “neither can I see. But just as you like. Anything to oblige a friend.”
A glimpse of the ostler’s darkening countenance decided Pitman. “All right,” he said desperately, “you drive. I’ll tell you where to go.”
On Michael in the character of charioteer (since this is not intended to be a novel of adventure) it would be superfluous to dwell at length. Pitman, as he sat holding on and gasping counsels, sole witness of this singular feat, knew not whether most to admire the driver’s valour or his undeserved good fortune. But the latter at least prevailed, the cart reached Cannon Street without disaster; and Mr. Brown’s piano was speedily and cleverly got on board.
“Well, sir,” said the leading porter, smiling as he mentally reckoned up a handful of loose silver, “that’s a mortal heavy piano.”
“It’s the richness of the tone,” returned Michael, as he drove away.
It was but a little distance in the rain, which now fell thick and quiet, to the neighbourhood of Mr. Gideon Forsyth’s chambers in the Temple. There, in a deserted by-street, Michael drew up the horses and gave them in charge to a blighted shoe-black; and the pair descending from the cart, whereon they had figured so incongruously, set forth on foot for the decisive scene of their adventure. For the first time Michael displayed a shadow of uneasiness.
“Are my whiskers right?” he asked. “It would be the devil and all if I was spotted.”