"I remember her well,--an active devil, but she could n't go for more than half a mile." "Well, I managed to screw a race out of her." "You must tell me all about that to-morrow; for I find my unfortunate head is like a bell with the vibration of the last stroke of the hammer on it. Don't forget,--to-morrow, sharp six. You 'll meet nobody but Broughton." "Dudley,--Sir Dudley Broughton?" "The same. You know him, then, already? Poor fellow! he's terribly cut up; but he 'll be glad to see an old friend. Have you been much together?" "A great deal. I made a cruise with him in his yacht, the 'Firefly.'" "What a rare piece of fortune to have met you!" cried Falkoner, as he shook my hand once more. And so, with the most fervent assurances of meeting on the morrow, we parted,--he, to saunter slowly towards his hotel; and I, to stand in the middle of the street, and, as I wiped the perspiration from my brow, to ask myself, had I gone clean mad. I was so overwhelmed by the shock of my own impudence that I stood where Falkoner left me, for full five minutes, motionless and spell-bound. To have boasted of my intimacy with Captain De Courcy, although the Atlantic rolled between us, was bad enough, in all conscience; but to have talked of Sir Dudley--the haughty, insolent, overbearing Sir Dudley Broughton--as "my old friend," was something that actually appalled me. How could my vain boastfulness have so far got the better of my natural keenness; how could my silly self-sufficiency have carried me so far? "Ah," thought I, "it was not the real Con Cregan who spoke such ineffable folly; these were the outpourings of that diabolical 'Thumbo-rig.'" While, therefore, I entered into a bond with myself to eschew that insidious compound in future, I also adopted the far more imminent and important resolve, to run away from New Orleans. Another sun must not set upon me in that city, come what might. With a shudder, I called to mind Sir Dudley's own avowal of his passion as a hater, and I could not venture to confront such danger.