Again the man sought the dark seclusion of the street. He wandered slowly toward a main thoroughfare, and entered the first public house he encountered. He ordered six pennyworth of brandy, and drank it at a gulp. Then he lit a pipe and went forth again. "That was an ugly-lookin' customer," said an _habitué_ to the barman. "'E 'ad a fice like a fifth act at the Surrey," agreed the other. If they knew the toast that Jocky Mason had pledged so readily, they would have better grasped the truth of this unfavorable diagnosis of his character. "Ten years' penal servitude, four years' police supervision, my wife dead, and my children lost, all through a smack on the head given me by Philip Anson," he communed. "Here's to getting even with him!" It was a strange outcome of his long imprisonment that the man should have acquired a fair degree of culture. He was compelled to learn in jail, to a certain extent, and reading soon became a pleasure to him. Moreover, he picked up an acquaintance with a smooth-spoken mate of the swell mobsman and long firm order--a dandy who strove to be elegant even in convict garb. Mason's great strength and indomitable courage appealed to the more artistic if more effeminate rogue; once the big man saved his comrade's life when they were at work in the quarries. The influence was mutual. They vowed lasting friendship. Victor Grenier was released six months before Mason, and the latter now crossed the river again to go to an address where he would probably receive some news of his professed ally's whereabouts. Grenier's name was imparted under inviolable confidence as that which he would adopt after his release. His real name, by which he was convicted, was something far less aristocratic. Philip's driver, being of the peculiar type of Londoner which seems to be created to occupy the dicky of a hansom, did not take his master down Park Lane, along Piccadilly, and so to Pall Mall. He loved corners. Give him the remotest chance of following a zigzag course, and he would follow it in preference to a route with all the directness of a Roman road. Thus it happened, as he spun round Carlos Place into Berkeley Square, he nearly collided with another vehicle which dashed into the square from Davies Street. Both horses pulled up with a jerk, there was a sharp fusillade of what cabmen call "langwidge," and the other hansom drove on, having the best of the strategical position by a stolen yard. Philip lifted the trapdoor. "Has he a fare, Wale?" "Yes, sir, a lydy." "Oh. Leave him alone, then. Otherwise, I would have liked to see you ride him off at the corner of Bruton Street." Wale, who was choleric, replied with such force that Philip tried to say, sternly: "Stop that swearing, Wale." "Beg pawdon, sir, I'm sure, but I wouldn't ha' minded if it wasn't my own old keb. Didn't you spot it?" "You don't tell me so. How odd!" "And to think of a brewer's drayman like that gettin' 'old of it. Well----"