w the natural inference from my dress and demeanour, and groaned
aloud.

"O, go away--get out of it, Ducie! Isn't one natural born ass enough for
me to deal with? You fellows are guying the whole show!"

"Byfield!" I called up eagerly, "I'm not drunk. Reach me down the
ladder, quick! A hundred guineas if you'll take me with you!" I saw over
the crowd, not ten deep behind me, the red head of the man in grey.

"That proves it," said Byfield. "Go away; or at least keep quiet. I'm
going to make a speech." He cleared his throat. "Ladies and
gentlemen----"

I held up my packet of notes, "Here's the money--for pity's sake, man!
There are bailiffs after me, in the crowd!"

"--the spectacle which you have honoured with your enlightened
patronage--I tell you I can't." He cast a glance behind him into the
car--"with your enlightened patronage, needs but few words of
introduction or commendation."

"Hear, hear!" from Dalmahoy.

"Your attendance proves the sincerity of your interest----"

I spread out the notes under his eyes. He blinked, but resolutely lifted
his voice.

"The spectacle of a solitary voyager----"

"Two hundred!" I called up.

"The spectacle of two hundred solitary voyagers--cradled in the brain of
a Montgolfier and a Charles--O, stop it! I'm no public speaker! How the
deuce----?"

There was a lurch and a heave in the crowd. "Pitch oot the drunken
loon!" cried a voice. The next moment I heard my cousin bawling for a
clear passage. With the tail of my eye I caught a glimpse of his
plethoric perspiring face as he came charging past the barrels of the
hydrogen-apparatus; and, with that, Byfield had shaken down a
rope-ladder and fixed it, and I was scrambling up like a cat.

"Cut the ropes!"

"Stop him!" my cousin bawled. "Stop the balloon! It's Champdivers, the
murderer!"

"Cut the ropes!" vociferated Byfield; and to my infinite relief I saw
that Dalmahoy was doing his best. A hand clutched at my heel. I let out
viciously, amid a roar of the crowd; felt the kick reach and rattle home
on somebody's teeth; and, as the crowd made a rush and the balloon
swayed and shot upwards, heaved myself over the rim into the car.

Recovering myself on the instant, I bent over. I had on my tongue a neat
farewell for Alain, but the sight of a hundred upturned and contorted
faces silenced me as a blow might. There had lain my real peril, in the
sudden wild-beast rage now suddenly baffled. I read it, as clear as
print