Stranger vanishes in the labyrinth of alleys round Leicester Square.




CHAPTER III.


On my return to the Lamb, I found that my uncle was in a soft sleep; and
after a morning visit from the surgeon, and his assurance that the fever
was fast subsiding, and all cause for alarm was gone, I thought it
necessary to go back to Trevanion's house and explain the reason for my
night's absence. But the family had not returned from the country.
Trevanion himself came up for a few hours in the afternoon, and seemed
to feel much for my poor uncle's illness. Though, as usual, very busy,
he accompanied me to the Lamb to see my father and cheer him up. Roland
still continued to mend, as the surgeon phrased it; and as we went back
to St. James's Square, Trevanion had the consideration to release me
from my oar in his galley for the next few days. My mind, relieved from
my anxiety for Roland, now turned to my new friend. It had not been
without an object that I had questioned the young man as to his
knowledge of French. Trevanion had a large correspondence in foreign
countries which was carried on in that language; and here I could be but
of little help to him. He himself, though he spoke and wrote French
with fluency and grammatical correctness, wanted that intimate knowledge
of the most delicate and diplomatic of all languages to satisfy his
classical purism.

For Trevanion was a terrible word-weigher. His taste was the plague of
my life and his own. His prepared speeches (or rather perorations) were