Derrick reached London on one of those mornings when she is at her very
best, and he felt his heart grow warm within him as he strode the
familiar pavements, and inhaled the air which seemed to him laden, not
with smoke but with the flowers which were blooming bravely in the parks
and squares. He had seen some beautiful places during his wanderings,
but it seemed to him that none of them could compare with this London
which every Englishman, abuse it as he may, regards sometimes with an
open and avowed affection, sometimes with a sneaking fondness.

Derrick was so full of the love of life, so thrilling with that sense of
youth and health for which millionaires would barter all their gold,
that it seemed to him difficult to believe that he was the same man who,
only a few months ago, had paced the same streets, weighed down by
misery and despair; indeed, as he thought of all that had happened, the
events took to themselves the character of a phantasmagoria in which Mr.
Bloxford, the circus people and Donna Elvira moved like insubstantial
shadows. But, standing out clearly in his mind, was the fact that he was
in London, with his pockets full of money and with one desire, one hope
predominating over all others, the desire, the hope of seeing the girl
at Brown's Buildings.

He would have made straight for "the Jail"; but Derrick's sense of duty
had not deserted him, and with a sigh of resignation, he betook himself
to an engineering firm, whose offices were in that Victoria Street down
which he had almost slunk the night he had left London, a fugitive. He
presented his credentials, transacted his business, and then, with a
fast-beating heart, walked--he could not have sat in a taxi, though it
should exceed the speed limit--to the Buildings.