6 ANGEL PAVEMENT

of the Pool, Dusk was falling; the river rippled darkly;
and the fleet of barges across the way was almost shape-
less. There was, however, enough daylight lingering
on the north bank, where the black piles and the white-
washed wharf edge above them still stood out sharply,
to give shape and character to the water front. Over
on the right, the grey stones of the Tower were faintly
luminous, as if they had contrived to store away a littJe
of their centuries of sunlight. The white pillars of the
Custom House were as plain as peeled wands. Nearer
still, two church spires thrust themselves above the blur
of stone and smoke and vague flickering lights: one was
as blanched and graceful as if it had been made of
twisted paper, a salute to Heaven from the City; the
other was abrupt and dark, a despairing appeal, the
finger of a hand flung out to the sky. Mr. Golspie, after
a brief glance, ignored the pair of them. They in their
turn, however, were dominated by the severely rect-
angular building to the left, boldly fronting the river
and looking over London Bridge with a hundred eyes,
a grim Assyrian bulk of stone. It challenged Mr.
Golspie's memory, so that he regarded it intently. It
was there when he was last in London, but was new
then. Adelaide House, that was it. But he still con-
tinued to look at it, and with respect, for the challenge
remained, though not to the memory. Both the blind
eyes and the lighted eyes of its innumerable windoxvs
seemed to answer his stare and to tell him that he did
not amount to very much, not here in London. Then
his gaze swept over the bridge to what could be seen
beyond. The Cold Storage place, and then, cavernous,
immense, the great black arch of Cannon Street Station,
and high above, far beyond, not in the city but in the sky