He could not come up to her because of the
shop, so once a week she used to go down to him. One did not ride ten
miles for a penny in those days, and she found the fare from Holloway to
Victoria and back a severe tax upon her purse. The same 'bus that took
her down at six brought her back at ten. During the first journey the
'bus conductor stared at Amenda; during the second he talked to her,
during the third he gave her a cocoanut, during the fourth he proposed to
her, and was promptly accepted. After that, Amenda was enabled to visit
her cheesemonger without expense.
He was a quaint character himself, this 'bus conductor. I often rode
with him to Fleet Street. He knew me quite well (I suppose Amenda must
have pointed me out to him), and would always ask me after her--aloud,
before all the other passengers, which was trying--and give me messages
to take back to her. Where women were concerned he had what is called "a
way" with him, and from the extent and variety of his female
acquaintance, and the evident tenderness with which the majority of them
regarded him, I am inclined to hope that Amenda's desertion of him (which
happened contemporaneously with her jilting of the cheesemonger) caused
him less prolonged suffering than might otherwise have been the case.
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