“Had we not better walk, then? I have to go as far as Somers Town—no great way; and we can talk as well walking as sitting.” “With pleasure,” answered Hugh, rising. “Will you take anything before you go? A glass of port? It is the only wine I happen to have.” “Not a drop, thank you. I seldom taste anything stronger than water.” “I like that. But I like a glass of port too. Come then.” And Falconer rose—and a great rising it was; for, as I have said, he was two or three inches taller than Hugh, and much broader across the shoulders; and Hugh was no stripling now. He could not help thinking again of his old friend, David Elginbrod, to whom he had to look up to find the living eyes of him, just as now he looked up to find Falconer’s. But there was a great difference between those organs in the two men. David’s had been of an ordinary size, pure keen blue, sparkling out of cerulean depths of peace and hope, full of lambent gleams when he was loving any one, and ever ready to be dimmed with the mists of rising emotion. All that Hugh could yet discover of Falconer’s eyes was, that they were large, and black as night, and set so far back in his head, that each gleamed out of its caverned arch like the reversed torch of the Greek Genius of Death, just before going out in night. Either the frontal sinus was very large, or his observant faculties were peculiarly developed. They went out, and walked for some distance in silence. Hugh ventured to say at length: “You said you had spent the day strangely: may I ask how?” “In a condemned cell in Newgate,” answered Falconer. “I am not in the habit of going to such places, but the man wanted to see me, and I went.” As Falconer said no more, and as Hugh was afraid of showing anything like vulgar curiosity, this thread of conversation broke. Nothing worth recording passed until they entered a narrow court in Somers Town. “Are you afraid of infection?” Falconer said. “Not in the least, if there be any reason for exposing myself to it.” “That is right.—And I need not ask if you are in good health.” “I am in perfect health.” “Then I need not mind asking you to wait for me till I come out of this house. There is typhus in it.” “I will wait with pleasure. I will go with you if I can be of any use.” “There is no occasion. It is not your business this time.” So saying, Falconer opened the door, and walked in. Said Hugh to himself: “I must tell this man the whole story; and with it all my own.” In a few minutes Falconer rejoined him, looking solemn, but with a kind of relieved expression on his face.