betook himself to a novel by way of distraction.

Two more days and they reached New York. They got in early in the
morning, and Maurice, the moment he found himself on shore, hurried to
the railway station. On inquiry there, however, he found that to start
immediately would be, in fact, rather to lose, than to gain time. A
train starting that evening would be his speediest conveyance; and for
that he resolved to wait. He then turned to a telegraph office,
intending to send a message to his father, but on second thoughts
abandoned that idea also, considering that Mr. Leigh already expected
him, and that further warning could do no good and might do harm.

He spent the day, he scarcely knew how. He dined somewhere, and read the
newspapers. He found himself out in the middle of reading with the
greatest appearance of interest an article copied from the _Times_ which
he had read in England weeks before. He looked perpetually at his watch,
and when, at last, he found that his train would be due in half an hour,
he started up in the greatest haste, and drove to the station as if he
had not a moment to spare.

What a Babel the car seemed when he did get into it! There were numbers
of women and children, not a few babies. It was bitterly cold, and
everybody was anxious to settle themselves at once for the night.
Everybody was talking, sitting down, and getting up again, turning the
seats backwards and forwards to suit their parties, or their fancies,
soothing the shivering, crying children, or discussing the probability
of being impeded by the snow. But when the train was fairly in motion,
when the conductor had made his progress through the cars, when
everybody had got their tickets, and there was no more to be done, all
subsided gradually into a dull sleepy quiet, broken occasionally by a