Page:Malot - Nobodys Boy, Crewe-Jones, 1916.djvu/326



HEN we got to the street the clerk hailed a cab and told us to jump in. The strange looking vehicle, with the coachman sitting on a box at the back of a hood that covered us, I learned later was a hansom cab. Mattia and I were huddled in a corner with Capi between our legs. The clerk took up the rest of the seat. Mattia had heard him tell the coachman to drive us to Bethnal-Green. The driver seemed none too anxious to take us there. Mattia and I thought it was probably on account of the distance. We both knew what "Green" meant in English, and Bethnal-Green undoubtedly was the name of the park where my people lived. For a long time the cab rolled through the busy streets of London. It was such a long way that I thought perhaps their estate was situated on the outskirts of the city. The word "green" made us think that it might be in the country. But nothing around us announced the country. We were in a very thickly populated quarter; the black mud splashed our cab as we drove along; then we turned into a much poorer part of the city and every now and again the