At ten o'clock the next morning Mr Marvel, dirty. tired, and worried, sat outside a little inn at Port Stowe. Beside him were the books, but now there were tied up with string. He had left the clothes in the woods beyond Bramblehurst. Mr Marvel sat on a wooden seat and, although no one took any notice of him, he seemed excited.
When he had been sitting for nearly an hour an old sailor, with a newspaper in his hand, came out of the inn and sat down beside him.