the carriage doors
were beginning to say a last good-bye to their friends inside. Porters
were hurling their last truck-loads of luggage into the vans; the guard
was a quarter of the way down the train looking at the tickets; the
newspaper boys were flitting about shouting noisily and inarticulately;
and the usual crowd of "just-in-times" were rushing headlong out of the
booking-office and hurling themselves at the crowded train.

I was at a loss what to do. It was impossible to say who was there and
who was not. McCrane might be there or he might not. What was the use
of my--

"Step inside if you're going," shouted a guard.

I saw a porter near the booking-office door advance towards the bell.

At the same moment I saw, or fancied I saw, at the window of a third-
class carriage a certain pale face appear momentarily, and, with an
anxious glance up at the clock, vanish again inside.

"Wait a second," I cried to the guard, "till I get a ticket."

"Not time now," I heard him say, as I dashed into the booking-office.

The clerk was shutting the window.

"Third single--anywhere--Fleetwood!" I shouted, flinging down a couple
of sovereigns.

I was vaguely aware of seizing the ticket, of hearing some one call
after me something about "change," of a whistle, the waving of a flag,
and a shout, "Stand away from the train." Next moment I was sprawling
on all fours on the knees of a carriage full of passengers; and before I
had time to look up the 1:30 train was outside Euston station.

It took me some time to recover from the perturbation of the start, and
still longer to overcome the bad impression which my entry had made on
my fellow-passengers.

Indeed I was made distinctly uncomfortable by the attitude which two, at
any rate, of these persons took up. One was a young man of the type
which I usually connect with detectives. The other was a rollicking
commercial traveller.

"You managed to do it, then?" said the latter to me when finally I had
shaken myself together and found a seat.

"Yes, just," said I.

The other man looked hard at me from behind a newspaper.

"Best to cut your sort of job fine," continued the commercial,
knowingly. "Awkward to meet a friend just when you're starting,
wouldn't it?" with a wink that he evidently meant to be funny.

I coloured up violently, and was aware that the other man had his eye on
me. I was being taken for a runaway!

"Worth my while to keep chummy with you