head loomed up above his own. He made the inevitable
involuntary whirl aside to move out of the way, the hansom passed, and
turning again, he went on. His movement had been too swift to allow of
his realizing the direction in which his turn had been made. He was
wholly unaware that when he crossed the street he crossed backward
instead of forward. He turned a corner literally feeling his way, went
on, turned another, and after walking the length of the street, suddenly
understood that he was in a strange place and had lost his bearings.

This was exactly what had happened to people on the day of the memorable
fog of three years before. He had heard them talking of such
experiences, and of the curious and baffling sensations they gave rise
to in the brain. Now he understood them. He could not be far from his
lodgings, but he felt like a man who was blind, and who had been turned
out of the path he knew. He had not the resource of the people whose
stories he had heard. He would not stop and address anyone. There could
be no certainty as to whom he might find himself speaking to. He would
speak to no one. He would wander about until he came upon some clew.
Even if he came upon none, the fog would surely lift a little and become
a trifle less dense in course of time. He drew up the collar of his
overcoat, pulled his hat down over his eyes and went on--his hand on the
thing he had thrust into a pocket.

He did not find his clew as he had hoped, and instead of lifting the fog
grew heavier. He found himself at last no longer striving for any end,
but rambling along mechanically, feeling like a man in a dream--a
nightmare. Once he recognized a weird suggestion in the mystery about
him. To-morrow might one be wandering about aimlessly in some such
haze. He hoped not.

His lodgings were not far from the Embankment, and he knew at last that
he was wandering along it, and had reached one of the bridges. His mood
led him to turn in upon it, and when he reached an embrasure to stop
near it and lean upon the parapet looking down. He could not see the
water, the fog was too dense, but he could hear some faint splashing
against stones. He had taken no food and was rather faint. What a
strange thing it was to feel faint for want of food--to stand alone, cut
off from every other human being--everything done for. No wonder that
sometimes, particularly on such days as these, there were plunges made
from the parapet--no won