"Well, good-bye my lad," I heard a jovial voice say. "Those tales of yours are as good as any I've heard in the city. But where you get 'em from, I can't think. That one about the soldier and the girl was a stunner. Ha! ha! ha! But you're a nice prize packet for a little hole like this. They ought to chain you up. Well, be a good boy, sonny. I mustn't stop another moment now. What's the time you say? Nearly five past four! Cripes, and I've got to strike the great smoke by midnight, and there's a hell of a way to go. But the old bus'll go like hell, too, when I step on the juice. Good-bye, old c**k, good-bye," and the car glided off, and the second part of my adventure had begun.
Now, under any circumstances that journey back to the city would have been a tiring one, but I am quite sure it
