Blind Corner

I

The Well-Digger’s Statement

When the first of these things happened, that is to say upon the twentieth day of April, 192‒, I was twenty-two years old, a little stronger than most men of my age, and very ready for anything that bade fair to prove more exciting than entering the office of my uncle, who was a merchant of consequence in the City of London.

I had lately been sent down from Oxford for using some avowed communists as many thought they deserved, and, though George Hanbury—for he had been with me in the affair—and I received much sympathy and more complimentary letters from complete strangers than we could conveniently answer, I think we were both more distressed than we would have cared to admit to take our leave of Christchurch before our time. For my part, I had been glad to get out of England and to put the matter as far away from my mind as ever I knew.

I had, then, spent five weeks at Biarritz, the guest of some people called Pomeroy, with whom, such was their benevolence, I believe I might have stayed indefinitely; but a letter from Hanbury, with whom I was to share a flat, threatening to forego the agreement if I did not return to Town, at length precipitated my departure.

I returned as I had come, alone in my car, making for Dieppe and spending the first night at Angoulême and the second at Tours.