So gallantly did Mr. Hoopdriver comport himself up to the very
edge of the Most Wonderful Day of all. It had begun early, you
will remember, with a vigil in a little sweetstuff shop next door
to the Angel at Midhurst. But to think of all the things that had
happened since then! He caught himself in the middle of a yawn,
pulled out his watch, saw the time was halfpast eleven, and
marched off, with a fine sense of heroism, bedward.



THE SURBITON INTERLUDE

XXVI

And here, thanks to the glorious institution of sleep, comes a
break in the narrative again. These absurd young people are
safely tucked away now, their heads full of glowing nonsense,
indeed, but the course of events at any rate is safe from any
fresh developments through their activities for the next eight
hours or more. They are both sleeping healthily you will perhaps
be astonished to hear. Here is the girl--what girls are coming to
nowadays only Mrs. Lynn Linton can tell!--in company with an
absolute stranger, of low extraction and uncertain accent,
unchaperoned and unabashed; indeed, now she fancies she is safe,
she is, if anything, a little proud of her own share in these
transactions. Then this Mr. Hoopdriver of yours, roseate idiot
that he is! is in illegal possession of a stolen bicycle, a
stolen young lady, and two stolen names, established with them in
an hotel that is quite beyond his means, and immensely proud of
himself in a somnolent way for these incomparable follies. There