CHAPTER II.
THE SICK MAN AT HYDE PARK CORNER.
Mr. Percival Wylde's first impulse upon perceiving the advancing foe, was to wheel round, and dart through Mr. Burton's screen to screen himself, as best he might, in the mazes of Hyde Park. His second impulse was to hail a passing cab, leap into it, and bid the cabby drive to Jericho. His third impulse was to meet the difficulty in the face,—take the bull by the horns—beard the lion in his den, and the Douglas in his hall,—and trust to his own boldness and readiness to bring him off the victor.
Mr. Percival Wylde decided ta act upon impulse the third.
He did this almost instantaneously; and, without altering his pace, or betraying by his features his sense of the disagreeable nature of the approaching rencontre, he advanced to meet the adversary. As he did so, he rapidly delivered this mental soliloquy: "The Governor, by all that 's blue! What on earth can have brought him to town? I thought the old bird was safe in Shropshire. He looks uncommonly black at seeing me. By Jove! I have done it now, and no mistake! I remember now! there was that letter I sent him the day before yesterday,—through being so beastly hard up,—telling him that I was very bad, and all the rest of it; and asking him to send me a cheque for medical fees, and all those sort of things. If he 's got that letter, what will he
