“To-morrow,” said I, halting at the Park corner, “I must be at work setting my business in motion. I have letters to write this evening, and a dozen of famous mechanicians to see to-morrow. In the evening we will put our heads together again.”
“Over my claret and a weed after it, understand,” said Biddulph.
“Yes, I’ll try whether you can take the taste of Missouri argee and pigtail out of my mouth.”
“You must be prepared to be made a lion of by my mother and cousins. They know the history of Don Fulano as well as a poet knows the pedigree of Pegasus. I have brought tears to many gentle eyes with the story of his martyrdom for liberty.”
“Ah, Fulano! if we only had him here! He would know how to aid us.”
I left them, and walked down Piccadilly to Smorley’s. Some of the eight waiters, who had seen me bolt, still regarded me with affright. I wrote my letters and went to bed.
My brain was still rolling in my skull with the inertia of its sea voyage. The blur and bustle of London perplexed me. I slept; but in my worried sleep I seemed to hear, above the roar in the streets, a far-away scream of a woman, as I had heard it in the pause of the gale at Fort Bridger. Then I seemed to have unhorsed the Iron Duke from his seat at Hyde Park Corner, and, mounted in his place and armed with the Nelson Column for a lance, to be charging along the highways and by-ways of London in chase of two dim, flying figures,—a lady pale as death, and a weary man in a long gray surtout.
CHAPTER XXX.
LONDON.
Short’s Cut-off shut out all other subjects from my head next morning.