man's hand beckoned him,
and he dared not disobey. He determined to go to Cornwall.

Outside in the darkness a clock chimed, and one of his own treasures
repeated the hour with a soft mellifluous note. Eleven! He had an idea
that there was--or used to be--a midnight train to Cornwall. He crossed to
his bureau and consulted a time-table. Yes--to Penzance from Paddington.
He decided to catch it.

His preparations for departure were quickly made. The writing of a note to
his clerk and the packing of a bag were matters soon accomplished. In a
quarter of an hour he had picked up a taxicab at the Holborn stand near
his chambers and was on his way to the station.

There was plenty of light and stir at Paddington, which appeared like a
great and glowing cavern in the cold darkness of the night. There were
engines shunting, cabs arriving, porters and passengers rushing about with
luggage, throngs of people. It happened that the midnight train from
Cornwall was overdue, and fluttered women waiting for friends were
importuning bored officials about the delay. Sleepy children stared with
wondering eyes at pictorial efforts to beguile the tedium of waiting for
trains. There were geographical posters comparing Cornwall favourably to
Italy; posters of girls in bathing costume beckoning to "the Cornish
Riviera;" posters of frolicsome puppies in baskets ticketed "Lucky Dogs,
They're Off to Penzance."

The passengers waiting for the midnight train to that resort did not do
equal justice to this flattering assumption of its delights. They seemed,
on the whole, rather to regard themselves as unlucky dogs (if the term
could be applied to parties of women), and were huddled together on the
station seats in attitudes suggestive of despair. Men flirting with
barmaids in the bars may have considered themselves lucky dogs, but whisky
played an important part in their exhilaration.

The belated train came rushing in with an effusion of steam, like a late
arrival puffing out apologies, bringing a large number of passengers back
to London from Penzance. They scrambled on to the platform with the
dishevelled appearance of people who had been cooped up for hours.
First-class passengers eased their pent-up energy by shouting for luggage
porters and bundling their women into taxicabs. The third-class
passengers, whose minor importance in the scheme of things did not warrant
such displays of self-importance, made meekly and wearily for the exits.