f
wholly on the fog.

'Play the game,' I said to myself. 'Nobody expects you; nobody will
recognize you.'

I advanced in rapid stages of ten yards or so, while grass
disappeared and soft sand took its place, pitted everywhere with
footmarks. I trod carefully, for obstructions began to show
themselves--an anchor, a heap of rusty cable; then a boat bottom
upwards, and, lying on it, a foul old meerschaum pipe. I paused here
and strained my ears, for there were sounds in many directions; the
same whistling (behind me now), heavy footsteps in front, and
somewhere beyond--fifty yards away, I reckoned--a buzz of guttural
conversation; from the same quarter there drifted to my nostrils the
acrid odour of coarse tobacco. Then a door banged.

I put the compass in my pocket (thinking 'south-east, southeast'),
placed the pipe between my teeth (ugh! the rank savour of it!) rammed
my sou'-wester hard down, and slouched on in the direction of the
door that had banged. A voice in front called, 'Karl Schicker'; a
nearer voice, that of the man whose footsteps I had heard
approaching, took it up and called 'Karl Schicker': I, too, took it
up, and, turning my back, called 'Karl Schicker' as gruffly and
gutturally as I could. The footsteps passed quite close to me, and
glancing over my shoulder I saw a young man passing, dressed very
like me, but wearing a sealskin cap instead of a sou'-wester. As he
walked he seemed to be counting coins in his palm. A hail came back
from the beach and the whistling stopped.

I now became aware that I was on a beaten track. These meetings were
hazardous, so I inclined aside, but not without misgivings, for the
path led towards the buzz of talk and the banging door, and these
were my only guides to the depot. Suddenly, and much before I
expected it, I knew rather than saw that a wall was in front of me;
now it was visible, the side of a low building of corrugated iron. A
pause to reconnoitre was absolutely necessary; but the knot of
talkers might have heard my footsteps, and I must at all costs not
suggest the groping of a stranger. I lit a match--two--and sucked
heavily (as I had seen navvies do) at my pipe, studying the trend of
the wall by reference to the sounds. There was a stale dottle wedged
in the bowl, and loathsome fumes resulted. Just then the same door
banged again; another name, which I forget, was called out. I decided
that I was at the end of a rectangular building which I pictured as
l