Then she made some inquiries of a policeman, and, in
consequence, got into a Kennington omnibus. Very shortly she was set
down close by Walcot Square. She walked about till, with some
difficulty in the darkness, she had discovered the number at which
Julian had told her his friend lived. The house found, she began to
pace up and down on the opposite pavement, always keeping her eyes
fixed on the same door. She was soon shivering in the cold night
air, and quickened her walk. It was rather more than an hour before
the door she was watching at length opened, and two friends came out
together. Harriet followed them as closely as she could, until she
saw that she herself was observed. Thereupon she walked away, and,
by a circuit, ultimately came back into the main road, where she
took a 'bus going northwards.
Harriet's cousin, when alone of an evening, sat in his bedroom, the
world shut out, his thoughts in long past times, rebuilding the
ruins of a fallen Empire.
When he was eighteen, the lad had the good luck to light upon a
cheap copy of Gibbon in a second-hand book-shop. It was the first
edition; six noble quarto volumes, clean and firm in the old
bindings. Often he had turned longing eyes upon newer copies of the
great book, but the price had always put them beyond his reach.
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