The Napoleon of Notting Hill
"I have no doubt," said Buck. "If that was Portobello Road, don't you see what happened?"
"I know what happened exceedingly well. I was knocked down four times; an experience which, as I say, has an effect on the mental attitude. And another thing happened, too. I knocked down two men. After the fourth fall (there was not much bloodshed—more brutal rushing and throwing—for nobody could use their weapons), after the fourth fall, I say, I got up like a devil, and I tore a poleaxe out of a man's hand and struck where I saw the scarlet of Wayne's fellows, struck again and again. Two of them went over, bleeding on the stones, thank God—and I laughed and found myself sprawling in the gutter again, and got up again, and struck again, and broke my halberd to pieces. I hurt a man's head, though."
Buck set down his glass with a bang, and spat out curses through his thick moustache.
"What is the matter?" asked Barker, stopping, for the man had been calm up to now, and now his agitation was far more violent than his own.
"The matter?" said Buck, bitterly; "don't you see how these maniacs have got us? Why
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