A Man from the North

Although he had visited London but once before, and then only for a few hours, he was not unfamiliar with the topography of the town, having frequently studied it in maps and an old copy of Kelly's directory.He walked slowly up Park Side and through Piccadilly, picking out as he passed them the French Embassy, Hyde Park Corner, Apsley House, Park Lane, and Devonshire House. As he drank in the mingled glare and glamour of Piccadilly by night,-the remote stars, the high sombre trees, the vast, dazzling interiors of clubs, the sinuous, flickering lines of traffic, the radiant faces of women framed in hansoms,-he laughed the laugh of luxurious contemplation, acutely happy. At last, at last, he had come into his inheritance. London accepted him. He was hers; she his; and nothing should part them. Starvation in London would itself be bliss. But he had no intention of starving! Filled with great purposes, he straightened his back, and just then a morsel of mud thrown up from a bus-wheel splashed warm and gritty on his cheek. He wiped it off caressingly, with a smile.Although it was Saturday night, and most of the shops were closed, an establishment where watches and trinkets of "Anglo-Spanish" gold, superb in appearance and pillowed on green plush, were retailed at alluring prices, still threw a brilliant light on the pavement, and Richard crossed the road to inspect its wares. He turned away, but retraced his steps and entered the shop. An assistant politely inquired his wishes."I want one of those hunters you have in the window at 29/6," said Richard, with a gruffness which must have been involuntary."Yes, sir. Here is one. We guarantee that the works are equal to the finest English lever.""I'll take it." He put down the money."Thank you. Can I show you anything else?""Nothing, thanks," still more gruffly."We have some excellent chains....""Nothing else, thanks." And he walked out, putting his purchase in his pocket. A perfectly reliable gold watch, which he had worn for years, already lay there.At Piccadilly Circus he loitered, and then crossed over and went along Coventry Street to Leicester Square. The immense façade of the Ottoman Theatre of Varieties, with its rows of illuminated windows and crescent moons set against the sky, rose before him, and the glory of it was intoxicating. It is not too much to say that the Ottoman held a stronger fascination for Richard than any other place in London. The British Museum, Fleet Street, and the Lyceum were magic names, but more magical than either was the name of the Ottoman. The Ottoman, on the rare occasions when it happened to be mentioned in Bursley, was a synonym for all the glittering vices of the metropolis. It stank in the nostrils of the London delegates who came down to speak at the annual meetings of the local Society for the Suppression of Vice. But how often had Richard, somnolent in chapel, mitigated the rigours of a long sermon by dreaming of an Ottoman ballet,-one of those voluptuous spectacles, all legs and white arms, which from time to time were described so ornately in the London daily papers.