He spread out his arms awkwardly to enforce his message of delay, and before he knew what had happened he was down on the stone floor, holding desperately to something living that struggled above him, but himself oblivious of his name and place. As he came to, the first thing he was conscious of was some considerable pain in the right arm upon which he lay. The next was a sharp memory of football in early youth, and the next was the sight of an over-well-dressed young man holding a top hat in his clenched hand, and sprinting a hundred yards away up the street.
The delay had been one of only a few seconds, but ten seconds is a hundred yards.
Jimmy saw a little knot of people running ahead. They took a turning and were lost to him; but Jimmy was too eager to suffer a check. Either Brassington was not Brassington, or there were two Brassingtons, or there was no Brassington, or pursy old merchants were Dons, or the world was standing on its head! But anyhow, one man knew the truth, and that one man must be gripped tight, and the truth had out of him—quick—quick!
Painful alternatives followed through Jimmy's mind as he ran—prison, suicide, enlistment—for in such an order of evils does
