appearance with every profession of delight. Early hours would seem to
lend a certain acidity to their badinage. By-and-by a more personal
note crept into their facetious comments. Two guardsmen on the top step
suddenly displayed, in return, a very creditable gift of repartee.
Covent Garden market was delighted. It felt the stern joy which
warriors feel with foemen worthy of their steel. It suspended its
juggling feats with vegetable baskets, and devoted itself exclusively
to the task of silencing our guns. Porters, costers, and the riff-raff
of the streets crowded in a semicircle around us. Just then it was
borne in on us how small our number was. A solid phalanx of the
toughest customers in London faced us. Behind this semicircle a line of
carts had been drawn up. Unseen enemies from behind this laager now
began to amuse themselves by bombarding us with the product of the
market garden. Tomatoes, cauliflowers, and potatoes came hurtling into
our midst. I saw Julian consulting his watch. "Five minutes more," he
said. I had noticed some minutes back that the ardour of the attack
seemed to centre round one man in particular--a short, very burly man
in a costume that seemed somehow vaguely nautical. His face wore the
expression of one cheerfully conscious of being well on the road to
intoxication. He was the ringleader. It was he who threw the largest
cabbage, the most _passe_ tomato. I don't suppose he had ever
enjoyed himself so much in his life. He was standing now on a cart full
of potatoes, and firing them in with tremendous force.

Kit saw him too.

"Why, there's that blackguard Tom!" she cried.

She had been told to sit down behind Malim for safety. Before anyone
could stop her, or had guessed her intention, she had pushed her way