Wakefield sifts his ideas , however , as minutely as he may , and finds himself curious to know the progress of matters at home -- how his exemplary wife will endure her widowhood of a week , and , briefly , how the little sphere of creatures and circumstances in which he was a central object will be affected by his removal . A morbid vanity , therefore , lies nearest the bottom of the affair . But how is he to attain his ends ? Not , certainly , by keeping close in this comfortable lodging , where , though he slept and awoke in the next street to his home , he is as effectually abroad as if the stage-coach had been whirling him away all night . Yet should he reappear , the whole project is knocked in the head . His poor brains being hopelessly puzzled with this dilemma , he at length ventures out , partly resolving to cross the head of the street and send one hasty glance toward his forsaken domicile . Habit -- for he is a man of habits -- takes him by the hand and guides him , wholly unaware , to his own door , where , just at the critical moment , he is aroused by the scraping of his foot upon the step . -- Wakefield , whither are you going ? At that instant his fate was turning on the pivot . Little dreaming of the doom to which his first backward step devotes him , he hurries away , breathless with agitation hitherto unfelt , and hardly dares turn his head at the distant corner . Can it be that nobody caught sight of him ? Will not the whole household -- the decent Mrs. Wakefield , the smart maid-servant and the dirty little footboy -- raise a hue-and-cry through London streets in pursuit of their fugitive lord and master ? Wonderful escape ! He gathers courage to pause and look homeward , but is perplexed with a sense of change about the familiar edifice such as affects us all when , after a separation of months or years , we again see some hill or lake or work of art with which we were friends of old . In ordinary cases this indescribable impression is caused by the comparison and contrast between our imperfect reminiscences and the reality . In Wakefield the magic of a single night has wrought a similar transformation , because in that brief period a great moral change has been effected . But this is a secret from himself . Before leaving the spot he catches a far and momentary glimpse of his wife passing athwart the front window with her face turned toward the head of the street . The crafty nincompoop takes to his heels , scared with the idea that among a thousand such atoms of mortality her eye must have detected him . Right glad is his heart , though his brain be somewhat dizzy , when he finds himself by the coal-fire of his lodgings .
So much for the commencement XXXXX this long whim-wham .
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