In my unhappy experience with the chimney-sweep I had seen that one can be a cab-driver on time,—how would it be if for twenty-four hours I myself were to fill such a post?
I seized my hat, so that the sacred fire of my first decision should not be cooled off by pedantic considerations, entered the yard below, and the office of the cab-owner.
At first he was little inclined to favour my plan; then gradually it dawned upon him that I should certainly be a very cheap cab-driver, who would cost him nothing, and moreover put thirty shillings into his pocket, a sum which I then and there counted upon the table. He began to treat me with a certain air of gentle indulgence, such as one bestows upon a person who is not fully in his right mind, and whom it is best not to irritate. One favourable circumstance was that he had just had a new coat and a new pair of trousers made for one of his drivers; provided these garments fitted me, I should put them on to-morrow. As far as the hat was concerned, he would let me take the one belonging to Gustav, the driver whose place I was to take.
“So then,—to-morrow morning at five o’clock,” he said, “right here in the yard!”
“I shall be here to-morrow morning at five o’clock,” I replied with an easy air, as if it were a daily habit of mine to get up at five. I was turning to go, when he called after me, “But you must leave your eye-glasses at home!” and he pointed to my nose; “that will never do for a cab-driver!”
“You are right,” I rejoined; “I shall get me a pair of steel spectacles.”
With that I left him, and partook myself to a masquerade-shop, where I procured a large beard to cover the lower part of my face, and a wig; beside my original object of disguising myself as far as possible, the thought of Gustav’s cocked hat made a special head-gear seem desirable. Beard and wig were sprinkled with grey, and must needs give me an air of homely dignity. In the shop of an optician I completed my outfit, looking through his entire stock of clumsy, old-fashioned spectacles. I could not find the desired steel spectacles, but there was a pair of horn ones with enormous circular glasses, by means of which my face gained an owl-like expression. That was what I wanted. Putting my treasures in my pocket, I stepped out upon the street, very well satisfied with myself. The energetic way in which I had seized upon this great enterprise pleased me; all my arrangements struck me as being exceedingly practical; I had a happy presentiment as to the success of my undertaking; this success I involuntarily carried into my thoughts of the novel that was to be, and I began to conjecture what remuneration I should demand. “I can’t let you have it cheap, gentlemen,” I said half-audibly with a triumphant smile, as I opened the door of the wine-room where I expected to meet my friends.
To evade every possibility of being recognised by them, I meant to tell them that I should be going out of town to-morrow.
This part of my programme also ran off smoothly. My friend Otto and all my other friends were present, and while my heart was leaping within me for proud joy over my new-discovered talent for adventure, I unfolded my fictitious plan of travel as coolly as possible.
The only person who seemed to be interested was my friend Otto.