Taxi broken down--wife peevish at having to walk remaining
distance. Keep it up, and I'll undertake to steer you past half the
police in London.'
"Well, I steered them past two, and without a question. Not one of
us knew our bearings, but we were making excellent weather of it, and
at length came out by the by-streets upon a fine broad thoroughfare
with an arc-lamp at the corner.
"I stared up at the building on my left, against which he lamp shone.
There was no street-sign at the angle, and an inscription in large
gilt letters on the facade was not very hopeful--ROYAL SOUTH LONDON
PICTUREDROME--yet to some extent reassuring. We were at any rate
lost in London; and not in Byzantium, as we might have deduced from
other architectural details.
"'And yet I am not wholly sure,' said I. 'We will ask the next
policeman. _Picturedrome_ now--barbaric union of West and East.--
Surely the word must be somewhere in Gibbon. Ever met it in Gibbon,
Farrell?'
"'No, I haven't,' he answered testily. 'Never was in Gibbon, to my
knowledge. Where is it? . . .
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