"When I have had my tub, I shall be quite another man," said he.
But it did not give him the usual fillip; on the contrary, he felt rather chilled.
"What can the matter be? I'm a changed man," said he, wondering, as people do at the days growing shorter in autumn, that time had produced some changes. "I remember when a scene or an excitement produced no more effect upon me, after the moment, than a glass of champagne; and now I feel as if I had swallowed poison, or drunk the cup of madness. Shaking!--hand, heart, every joint. I have grown such a muff!"
Mr. Longcluse had at length completed his very careless toilet, and looking ill, went down-stairs in his dressing-gown and slippers.
In little more than half-an-hour, as Mr. Longcluse was sitting at his breakfast in his dining-room, Richard Arden was shown in.
"Dressing-gown and slippers--what a lazy dog I am compared with you!" said Longcluse gaily as he entered.
"Don't say another word on that subject, I beg. I should have been later myself, had I dared; but my Uncle David had appointed to meet me at ten."
"Well, as I have had no breakfast, I don't mind if I do," said Arden, laughing.
"When did you leave that place last night?" asked Longcluse.
"I fancy about the same time that you went--about five or ten minutes after the match ended. You heard there was a man murdered in a passage there? I tried to get down and see it but the crowd was awful."
"I was more lucky--I came earlier," said Longcluse. "It was perfectly sickening, and I have been seedy ever since. You may guess what a shock it was to me. The murdered man was that poor little Frenchman I told you of, who had been talking to me, in high spirits, just before the play began--and there he was, poor fellow! You'll see it all there; it makes me sick."
"Yes, I see. I daresay the police will make him out," said Arden, as he glanced hastily over it. "Did you remark some awfully ill-looking fellows there?"
"I never saw so many together in a place of the kind before," said Longcluse.
"That's a capital account of the match," said Arden, whom it interested more than the tragedy of poor little Lebas did. He read snatches of it aloud as he ate his breakfast: and then, laying the paper down, he said, "By-the-bye, I need not bother you by asking your advice, as I intended. My uncle David has been blowing me up, and I think he'll make everything straight. When he sends for me and gives me an awful lecture, he always makes it up to me afterwards."