A morning-suit which he had commanded being miraculously
finished, he put it on, and was at once not only spectacularly but
morally regenerated. The old suit, though it had cost five guineas
in its time, looked a paltry and a dowdy thing as it lay, flung down
anyhow, on one of Messrs Quayther & Cuthering's cane chairs in the
mirrored cubicle where baronets and even peers showed their braces to
the benign Mr. Cuthering.
"I want to go to Piccadilly Circus now. Stop at the fountain," said
Edward Henry to his chauffeur. He gave the order somewhat defiantly,
because he was a little self-conscious in the new and gleaming suit,
and because he had an absurd idea that the chauffeur might guess that
he, a provincial from the Five Towns, was about to venture into West
End theatrical enterprise and sneer at him accordingly.
But the chauffeur merely touched his cap with an indifferent and lofty
gesture, as if to say:
"Be at ease. I have driven persons more moon-struck even than you.
Human eccentricity has long since ceased to surprise me."
The fountain in Piccadilly Circus was the gayest thing in London. It
mingled the fresh tinkling of water with the odour and flame of autumn
blossoms and the variegated colours of shawled women who passed their
lives on its margin engaged in the commerce of flowers. Edward Henry
bought an aster from a fine bold, red-cheeked, blowsy, dirty wench
with a baby in her arms, and left some change for the baby.
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