It is not that I dislike the little man, or have the Briton's nervous shrinking from being seen in eccentric society; but I wish to eliminate mediaevalism as far as possible from my quest.

In conjunction with this crazy-headed little trainer of cats it would become too preposterous even for my light sardonic humour.

I resolved to dismiss him from my mind altogether.
Yet, in spite of my determination, and in spite of one of Monsieur Lenotre's fascinating monographs on the French Revolution, on which I had counted to beguile the tedium of the journey, I could not get Anastasius Papadopoulos out of my head.

He stayed with me the whole of a storm-tossed night, and all the next morning.

He has haunted my brain ever since.