He felt light-hearted, as though he had been ambushed all alone in a jungle many thousands of miles away from departmental desks and official inkstands.
This joyousness and dispersion of thought before a task of some importance seems to prove that this world of ours is not such a very serious affair after all.

For the Assistant Commissioner was not constitutionally inclined to levity.
The policeman on the beat projected his sombre and moving form against the luminous glory of oranges and lemons, and entered Brett Street without haste.

The Assistant Commissioner, as though he were a member of the criminal classes, lingered out of sight, awaiting his return.

But this constable seemed to be lost for ever to the force.

He never returned: must have gone out at the other end of Brett Street.
The Assistant Commissioner, reaching this conclusion, entered the street in his turn, and came upon a large van arrested in front of the dimly lit window-panes of a carter's eating-house.