"I don't know. Just walk, I suppose. I'll see!"
"I like you, sonnie, I like your voice. Let's keep on, it'll never do to stand in one place, they don't like it. Just come to the lamp there. I'd like to look at you!"
He found that a large, warm, somewhat flabby hand had taken his own. They walked together to a lamp. His friend got hold of his forehead with one hand and his chin with the other, and exposed his face to the falling lamplight. He caught a glimpse of the lady's face above the heavy chain of rolled gold that lay on her bosom. Her face was pallid round the fringes of the cheeks and on the tip of her nose, and by contrast, her cheeks were singularly red. Her lips too were red, quite unlike the red of Channah's lips and his mother's. It was a sleepy, fat face, rather kindly. There was something strange about her eyes, something like—well, funny eyes, anyhow! Hungry eyes they were, a little wild, yet they were sleepy and kind, too. Surely her breath didn't smell the least bit of beer? No, not such a thoroughly estimable lady! Perhaps it was beer ... the poor lady had to take for her health?
"Sonnie!" she said. "You've been having a heavy time, eh? Poor kid! You've got nice eyes, you know! Be careful what you do with 'em. It was eyes like yours what did for Bertha. Poor Bertha! She was a slim lass once, Prayer Book and all, and parasol on Sundays, all complete!"
"Who's Bertha, please?"
"Hush, sonnie, hush, I'm talking! Bertha? Don't tell Reginald—I'm Bertha! He wasn't a big feller neither, what done her in! And it wasn't for money, anyways, I can tell you. Love it was, and it isn't all the girls can say that! And he went with his lips this way and with his eyes that way, and where was you? Yes, he had eyes just like yours, Arthur! Your name is Arthur, isn't it?"
"No, my name's Philip!"
"Oh, we are a gentleman, aren't we? 'No, my name's Philip!' Haw! haw! Your name's not Philip, see? Your name's Arthur! What's good enough for him is good enough for you, Arthur. So there, Arthur! ... I'm sorry, kid, I'm not laughing at you. You see, I'm feeling all funny like...." She passed the back of her hand across her forehead. A big bead of clammy sweat was thrust backward into the maze of her yellowish hair. "To tell you the honest, Arthur," she whispered, leaning over towards the boy, "he's been and pitched me out!" She lifted her voice. "Pitched me out, he has, the dirty heathen, at two o'clock in the morning! After all the times we've had together. Scarborough! Oh, Scarborough! The waiters stand round you and says 'Lobster, ma'am, with hock?' polite as polite! And here am I! Not good enough for the likes of him, ain't I? I'll show him up! Pitched me out...." She took a fluffy handkerchief from the depths of her blouse and tapped each eye.
"I beg your pardon," said Philip with uneasy politeness, "have you had to leave home too?"
"Home, sonnie, home? I've got a home! Oh, it's all right about my home! But now and again a night out, eh, is the goods for Bertha! I'm one of the girls! I'm a bird! I'm not too particular about my perch, though I have got a little perch of my own! But I was ... hello! Some one's coming! Can you see who it is?"