“She will always bless you,” said the other, kissing the ring reverently—“as I bless her! I do not know your names, gentlemen—nor, in the circumstances, ask them. But if ever Fate should lead you to Poland, the home of Count Leo Riersiwicz is your home.”
“Quite a charming little adventure,” said O’Hagan, as we passed westward; “save that one cannot sympathise with any man who elects to associate with such a crew of undesirable pole-cats.”
Two peers, a newspaper proprietor, and an actor-manager waited upon the kerb of Oxford Circus, whilst ’bus drivers, draymen, vanmen on vans and other impossibles, drove by. O’Hagan’s procedure on occasions of this kind is a joy unique and a memory ineffaceable.
Regardless of the direction, language, behaviour, or wishes of such persons, he proceeds across the road at the same dignified and even pace which he had observed upon the pavement. With dray horses standing on their hind-legs and waving their fore-legs over his picturesque head, with taxi-cabs menacing plate-glass windows, and motor ’busses hastily diverting their routes, he pauses to light an Egyptian cigarette.
Having returned his gold matchbox to his waistcoat pocket, unruffled he pursues his way, the only extant example of the grand seigneur.
The End
This edition is limited to 1,000 copies.
In Memoriam—Sax Rohmer
1883-1959