noon
The ambitious young man with one ear open for stellar voices , and the overburdened John Bunyan , and any number of other short-winded pedestrians , could no longer monopolize the upward and onward literature of our own or former times . I too had arrived . Another jerk to the right -- a trot up an incline , and we stopped at a steep flight of steps -- a regular Jacob 's - ladder flight -- leading to a corridor dimly lighted by the flare of a single gas jet . Up this I stumbled , lugging the bags once more , my whole mind bent on reaching the platform at the earliest possible moment -- a curious mental attitude , I am aware , for a man who had eaten nothing since noon , was still wet and shivering inside , and half frozen outside -- nose , cheeks , and fingers -- from a wind that cut like a circular saw . As I landed the last bag on the top step -- the fog-horn could n't leave his horse -- I became conscious of the movements of a short , rotund , shad-shaped gentleman in immaculate white waistcoat , stiff choker and wide expanse of shirt front . He was approaching me from the door of the lecture hall in which sat the audience ; then a clammy hand was thrust out -- and a thin voice trickled this sentence : `` You 're considerable late sir -- our people have been in their -- '' `` I am _ what ! _ '' I cried , straightening up .