"Oh, mind!" she protested, withdrawing from the embrace. "People can see us."
"My dear, they don't matter. They don't matter a damn. Not one of them matters the tiniest dash."
Nor did they indeed to lovers in the warm apricot of a fine September sunset. What to them were dusty clerks with green shining elbows, and government officials and policemen, and old women with baskets of tawny chrysanthemums? Fairies only were fit to be their companions. The taxi hummed on over the road shadowed by the stilted Gothic of the Houses of Parliament, hummed out of the shadow and into Grosvenor Road, where the sun was splashing the river with pools of coppery light. The stream was losing its burnished ripples and a gray mist was veiling the fire-crowned chimneys of Nine Elms when the taxi drew up by 422 Grosvenor Road.
"Right to the very top," called Maurice. "I do hope you don't mind."
As he spoke he caught her round the waist and gathered her to his side to climb the stairs.
"It's an old house. I've got an attic for my studio. Castleton's out. An old woman buried somewhere near the center of the earth cooks for me. When you see her, you'll think she's arrived via Etna. Jenny, I'm frightfully excited at showing you my studio."
At last they reached the topmost landing, which was lit by a skylight opaque with spiders' webs and dust. The landing itself was full of rubbish, old clothes, and tattered volumes and, as if Maurice sought to emulate Phaethon, a bicycle.
"Not in these!" said Jenny. "You don't carry that up and down all these stairs every day?"
"Never," said Maurice gayly. "Not once since I carried it up for the first time a year ago."
"You silly old thing."