e, and myself walked towards the railway station. 'You will
be missing him now.'

This was true. All the routine, all the _alertes_, the meetings, the
missions of those eleven months were about to cease abruptly. What had at
first seemed to me novel had with time become confirmed habit, and for
the first few days after M. Zola's departure I felt my occupation gone.

That departure took place, as arranged, on Sunday evening, June 4. It was
the day when President Loubet was cowardly assailed at a race-meeting by
the friends and partisans of the foolish Duke of Orleans; but of all that
we remained (_pro tem._) in blissful ignorance. The Fasquelles went down
to Norwood and brought M. Zola to Victoria. I was busy during the day
preparing for the 'Westminster Gazette' an English epitome of the
declaration which 'L'Aurore' was to publish on the morrow. That work
accomplished, I met the others on their arrival in town. Wareham had been
warned of the change in the programme on the previous night, and came up
from Wimbledon with my wife. There was a hasty scramble of a dinner at a
restaurant near Victoria. We were served, I remember, by a very amusing
and familiar waiter, who, addressing M. Zola by preference (I wonder if
he recognised him?), kept on repeating that he was a 'citizen of the most
noble Helvetian Confederation,' and assured us that potatoes for two
would be ample, and that chicken for three would be as much as we should
care to eat. 'Take this,' said he, 'it's to-day's. Don't have that, it
was cooked yesterday.' And all this made us extremely merry. 'It seems to
me more than ever that I am living in a dream,' said M. Zola after a
final laugh. 'That waiter has given the finishing touch to my illusion.'

The train started at nine P.M., and we had a full quarter of an hour at
our disposal for our leave-takings in the dimly-lighted station. There
were few passengers travelling that night, and few loiterers about. We
made M. Zola take his seat in a compartment, and stood on guard before it
talking to him. Only one gentleman, a short dapper individual with
mutton-chop whiskers (Wareham suggested that he looked like a barrister),
paid any attention to the master, and, it may be, recognised him. For the
rest, all went well. There were _au revoirs_ and handshakes all round,
and messages, too, for one and another. And M. Zola would have his little
joke. 'If you should come across Esterhazy,' he said to me, 'tell him
that I'v