Part Two Paradise Regained Chapter 24 Miserrimus Dexter--First View

We had dawdled over our luncheon before Mrs. Macallan arrived at Benjamin's cottage. The ensuing conversation between the old lady and myself (of which I have only presented a brief abstract) lasted until quite late in the afternoon. The sun was setting in heavy clouds when we got into the carriage, and the autumn twilight began to fall around us while we were still on the road.

The direction in which we drove took us (as well as I could judge) toward the great northern suburb of London.

For more than an hour the carriage threaded its way through a dingy brick labyrinth of streets, growing smaller and smaller and dirtier and dirtier the further we went. Emerging from the labyrinth, I noticed in the gathering darkness dreary patches of waste ground which seemed to be neither town nor country. Crossing these, we passed some forlorn outlying groups of houses with dim little scattered shops among them, looking like lost country villages wandering on the way to London, disfigured and smoke-dried already by their journey. Darker and darker and drearier and drearier the prospect drew, until the carriage stopped at last, and Mrs. Macallan announced, in her sharply satirical way, that we had reached the end of our journey. "Prince Dexter's Palace, my dear," she said. "What do you think of it?"

I looked around me, not knowing what to think of it, if the truth must be told.