cardboard slips, then hesitated as he glanced at the straps
and the top of the black erection on Wilkinson's shoulders, and
enquired, "Second class, eh?" The dominie was angry, his face
crimsoned, his hand shook with indignation. Being a moral man, he would
not use bad language, but he roared in his most stentorian academic
tone, a tone which appalled the young agent with rapid visions of
unfortunate school days, "Second Tom-cats! Does the company put you
there to insult gentlemen?" It was the agent's turn to redden, and then
to apologize, as he mildly laid the tickets down, without the usual
slap, and fumbled over their money. The feminine giggling redoubled, and
Coristine, who had regained his equilibrium, met his friend with a
hearty laugh, and the loud greeting, "O Lord, Wilks, didn't I tell you
the fools would be taking us for bagmen?" But Wilkinson's irritation was
deep, and he marched to the incoming train, ejaculating, "Fool, idiot,
puppy; I shall report him for incivility, according to the printed
invitation of the company. Second! ach! I was never so insulted in my
life."

There was room enough inside the car to give the travellers a double
seat, half for themselves and the other for their knapsacks. These
impedimenta being removed the occupants of the carriage became aware
that they were in the company of two good-looking men, of refined
features, and in plain but gentlemanly attire. The lady passengers
glanced at them, from time to time, with approbation not unmingled with
amusement, but no responsive glance came from the bachelors. Wilkinson
had opened his knapsack, and had taken out his pocket Wordsworth, the
true poet, he said, for an excursion. Coristine had a volume of Browning
in his kit, but left it there, and went into the smoking-car for an
after breakfast whiff. The car had been swept out that morning by the
joint efforts of a brakesman and the newsagent, so that it was less
hideously repulsive than at a later stage in the day, when tobacco
juice, orange peel, and scraps of newspapers made it unfit for a decent
pig. The lawyer took out his plug, more easily carried than cut tobacco,
and whittled it down with his knife to fill his handsome Turk's head
meerschaum. When all was ready, he discovered, to his infinite disgust,
that he had no matches nor pipe-lights of any description. The news
agent, Frank, a well-known character on the road, supplied him with a
box of Eddy's manufacture, for which he de