“Is it you?” screeched a female voice and began to scold.
“For whom do you take me?” Christopher was painfully aware of the proximity of the soft body. He stepped back and picked his hat up.
The girl began to laugh shamelessly. For a time she scrutinized Christopher curiously. The boy’s suit was made of costly cloth. His collar was clean. His necktie white. She tried to appear genteel.
“I was expecting my brother,” she whimpered. “I live here near the fishmarket. Perhaps the young gentleman would see me home?”
“And your brother?”
The girl shrugged her shoulders. They were already walking side by side through the narrow lane. They emerged under the rare lamps as if ascending inclines of light. Then again they sank into darkness. Above the roofs the narrow sky appeared like an inverted abyss with stars at its bottom. Here and there a little light blinked indifferently, strangely, from a window. Just like human beings gazing from stout, safe walls on those excluded.
Christopher felt hopelessly alone. Even the sound of the girl’s steps seemed foreign. The darkness was empty. All was falsehood behind the doors and windows: purity, grace, kisses.... Tears ran down his cheeks.
The girl stopped in front of the door of a low house. Her expressionless eyes looked into Christopher’s. She saw that he wept. It was a familiar sight to her. At first they cry and are as docile as dogs. All that alters later on.
She began to balance her hips and pressed against him.
“Come in....” Her voice was heavy and like a bird of prey. She unexpectedly pressed her moist lips on the boy’s mouth.