Then a soldier, smart and pert, strolled up, a flower between his lips
and a good-looking girl beside him. Away in front of us were the top
windows and the roofs of St. Anne's Mansions. Farther, on the left, the
clock tower of Westminster glinted in the sun-rays.
'Fine ducks!' said M. Zola.
'A pretty corner,' added Desmoulin, waving his hand towards some branches
that drooped to the water's edge. And suddenly I remembered and told them
of another French exile, the epicurean St. Evremond, whose needs were
relieved by Charles II. appointing him governor of yonder Duck Island at
a salary of three hundred pounds a year.
'Well, I have little money in my pocket,' quoth Zola, 'but I don't think
I shall come to that. I hope that my pen alone will always yield me the
little I require.'
But Big Ben struck the hour. It was six o'clock. So we separated, Messrs.
Zola and Desmoulin to retire to the dungeon at the Grosvenor, and I to go
in search of my friend the solicitor at his private house at Wimbledon.
III
DANGER SIGNALS
That evening, I called upon my friend--Mr.
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