“’ullo, dearie!” he heard a timid quavering voice at his elbow. “Waitin’ for anybody in partic’lar?”
He turned quickly.
And the poor draggled little street-walker turned her starved, painted cheeks up to him under the hectic lamplight. A thin rain was drizzling down mercilessly.… A taxicab was cruising slowly along the edge of the pavement.… The street-lamps went on shining impassively.… The darkened houses towered above, secretly, ominously.… How long the night.… How cold the pavement of stone.…
She laid her hand on his arm, wistfully a little, he thought.… Even in those world-weary features there was beauty left.… Something of graciousness and evanescent youth lingered still under the hard Cockney tang of her voice.… What history cowered beneath that monstrous masque of maquillage…?
He would give much to know.…
But afar off, as from some half-forgotten world, he seemed to hear the mellow, golden patterning of bells, bells weaving their intricate spell of beauty about another city than this dark Babel, a City of grave spires and a curving street and quiet immemorial lanes.…
“No, carissima,” he smiled at her with the true ffoulis charm. “No. Your body is beautiful. But my soul is beautiful. We can never, never understand each other.”
He expected to see this flotsam-flower of London shuffle off into the Suburran[12] darkness. But she answered:
[12] Suburban? (Lit. Exec.).