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I had ready-cash no matter how out of the way I might be, with no traveller's-bankers in the vicinity, not even of any kind. Simple explanation. What his problem was I didn't know. Was I some kind of secret agent, smuggling money to the rebels in Scotland, i.e. Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped-style ? He was somewhat educated and polite. I began to get the idea, that it might have been maybe a character-study for him.
Dover was unlucky for me. The first time through, I slept outside of Dover and wound up in a dragnet. This was a similar situation. I passed through Dover and camped just before dark. I remember I fried something; had probably steamed some potatoes, a vegetable maybe and French bread. I had tea I remember distinctly, with my pipe. I was in a little clearing in a brambled woods, surrounded by trees, thicket, big and small. By that time it had gotten dark, and although early around nine, I always got into my sleeping bag when it got dark. Which I did and as I was laying there, probably imaging the days events, I heard distinct footstep-sounds in the leaves, coming toward me and stopping, about thirty feet away. I instantly became fearful. I lay there and listened and pondered, what all the possible scenarios of this situation might entail. Why would somebody just walk to there and stop ? I was getting more and more afraid. Maybe it was a deer. I have heard footsteps in the leaves all of my life. This was human footsteps. Why are they standing there ? I started to have - never-ever known such fear before. I slid down in my sleeping bag, to retrieve at the bottom, a knife which I always carried there as a precaution.
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