But when a few hundred yards farther on he stood still again to listen, his heart stood still also, for he heard from that space of rugged stones the clinking crutch and labouring feet of the infernal cripple.
The sky above was loaded with the clouds of snow, leaving London in a darkness and oppression premature for that hour of the evening.

On each side of Syme the walls of the alley were blind and featureless; there was no little window or any kind of eve.

He felt a new impulse to break out of this hive of houses, and to get once more into the open and lamp-lit street.

Yet he rambled and dodged for a long time before he struck the main thoroughfare.

When he did so, he struck it much farther up than he had fancied.